The River

The River Relocates!

2009-10-05T19:16:00.000-07:00

Looking for The River? We are stirring things up at our new location! Click here to go there now. And jump right in, the water's fine.

Jimmy Carter Turns 85

2009-10-01T20:43:00.000-07:00

Proving the adage that there's no fool like an old fool, old fool Jimmy Carter turned 85 today. Happy Birthday, Jimmy.

Oh, and by the way, that remark about the vast majority of Obama's critics being racists? He didn't mean it that way. Or we didn't hear it right. Or something.

From Fox News: Carter Walks Back Claim Obama Critics Racist

Former President Jimmy Carter on Thursday softened his claim that an "overwhelming portion" of criticism toward President Obama is race-based.

Carter said in an interview that he was only talking about a "fringe element" when he made the controversial remarks two weeks ago. He stood by his original remarks, but argued that they were misinterpreted.

"I said those that had a personal attack on President Obama as a person, that was tinged with racism," Carter told CNN. "But I recognize that people that disagree with him on health care or the environment, that the vast majority of those are not tinged with racism."

He added: "I meant exactly what I said. What I actually said, if you look at the transcript, is just what I just repeated to you."

Carter's original remarks came at the height of controversy over Rep. Joe Wilson's outburst during Obama's address to Congress last month. Wilson shouted "You lie!" at the president, an act Carter said was "based on racism."

In an interview with NBC, he offered an even broader assessment.

"I think an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man, that he is African-American," Carter said at the time.

Sorry, Jim man. Not buying.

Ecclesiastes 4:13 (NKJV)
Better a poor and wise youth
Than an old and foolish king who will be admonished no more.

Montana and Gun Control

2009-10-01T18:27:00.000-07:00

From Newsmax.com - (read the whole article.)

HELENA, Mont. -- If Montana has its way in a lawsuit filed Thursday, there will be far less federal gun control in the state.

The state's libertarian streak--which has spawned efforts to buck the federal Real ID Act and sparked widespread contempt for the Patriot Act--is now triggering a fight over whether Montana should have sovereignty over made-in-Montana guns and equipment.

If gun advocates win, the state could decide which rules, if any, would control the manufacturer, sale and purchase of guns and paraphernalia. And Montana would be exempt from rules on federal gun registration, background checks and dealer-licensing.

"For guns, it means we can make our own in Montana and sell them in Montana as long as they are stamped 'Made in Montana' and don't leave the state," said Gary Marbut, who runs the Montana Shooting Sports Association and is leading the lawsuit. "We will be able to do that without federal regulation, or having the ATF breath down your neck."

The association, joined by the Second Amendment Foundation in the lawsuit, hopes to ultimately win a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that limits the application and reach of federal rules over state business. The suit is challenging the right of the federal government to oversee gun sales under the guise of interstate commerce regulation.

This is wonderful news. Once upon a time, the federal government did not dare to overstep its bounds and usurp the authority of the individual states, as spelled out in the Constitution, specifically the 10th Amendment:

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Then came FDR and the search for a way around the Constitution in order to expand federal power and control everything from Washington D.C. It was found in the interstate commerce clause. This clause was used as a pretext to, in effect, overturn the 10th amendment, make it pointless. Their willing accomplices in the Supreme Court at the time shamelessly aided and abetted them in this virtual coup. The interstate commerce clause has since been the pretext by which the federal government has usurped the sovereignty of the individual states in a whole host of areas.

Understand that much of what Washington has done over the last 80 years would have been considered unconstitutional by the framers of the Constitution, and while some of them warned that this sort of thing might eventually happen (the anti-federalists, for example), others of them believed that there were enough safeguards to ensure that it would not (the federalists). All of them would be appalled at what Washington has become.

But the last few months have brought us the rumblings of a coming storm. Some of the states have had enough and are starting to push back. We saw this when a few governors spoke out against the stimulus bill and threatened to turn down funds allocated to their states because of the controlling strings which were attached. Here in Texas we have heard this kind of anti-Washington-control rhetoric from our governor Rick Perry, who is moving swiftly to the right in an attempt to secure the Republican nomination for another term as governor in the face of stiff opposition from Kay Bailey Hutchison. Now we have Montana deliberately pushing back against the machine. It could not come at a better time. Let us hope for the best.

I will keep you posted.

The Future of Health Care?

2009-09-30T19:10:00.000-07:00

Dr. Lemuel Calhoon, magister maximus of Hillbilly White Trash, posted this gem at the end of one of his weekly re-postings of Ann Coulter's op-ed genius. I wanted to bring it here because, well, he is exactly right.

Read it for yourself here, or go there and read it.

Lemuel Calhoon:

"The absolute worst thing about socialized medicine in the US is that it will slow the advancement of of medical science in the whole world to a glacial pace.

Right now the vast majority of new medical techniques, drugs and technology are discovered in the United States. This is because America still has a thriving free market health care system. For-profit companies which develop and manufacture drugs and medical equipment are free to pour their profits into research and development to bring new medications and medical equipment to market. All in pursuit of profit.

Because our doctors are not employees of any kind of National Health Service they are not required to see X number of patients per week and to choose only from a government approved list of treatment options (approved more for reasons of cost than effectiveness). Doctors in the US are free to innovate and experiment.

The fact that in America we attempt to keep our elderly people alive as long as possible and give them the best quality of life possible (in addition to proving our moral superiority to other nations) provides a test bed for methods of managing, treating and even curing chronic conditions which are associated with (but by no means exclusive to) aging. You can see that this is far more conducive to creating an upward spiral of medical knowledge than the "give granny morphine until she stops breathing" approach taken by nations with government run health care.

Let me tell you a true story about Mother Calhoon, who is 76. Earlier this year she broke her leg. In 1950 the doctor would have set the bone and put her leg in a cast. The bone would have taken the better part of a year to heal and would have never been the same. During this time her mobility would have been so severely restricted that she would have not been able to live at home alone. So mom would have gone to a nursing home where she would probably have spent the rest of her life. But the doctor's bill for setting the leg and applying the cast would have only been a few hundred dollars.

Today mom was taken to an excellent hospital where a doctor operated on her leg installing a metal rod to support the bone so that it would not break again. She was given a battery of tests which determined that she had mild osteoporosis and was put on medication to treat the condition. After a few days in the hospital she was sent home where a nurse looked in on her three times a week for the next three months. The cast on her leg was designed to allow her to walk and she was encouraged to do so (with the aid of a walker, then a cane). As time went by she was instructed to put more and more weight on the leg until now, less than a year later, she has no cast and no longer needs walker or cane (unless she is going to walk for more than two miles or so, then she brings along the cane). The cost of the entire episode came to around $40,000.00 - which comes to $4500.00 in 1950 dollars.

Assuming that we do not plunge down Barack Obama's rat hole of socialized medicine and freeze the advancement of medical science what can a 76-year-0ld woman with a broken leg expect in 2050?

With the proviso that no one can predict the future with absolute accuracy I would assume based on current trends in medical science that it would go something like this:

The ambulance brings the patient to the emergency room where a doctor scans her leg building a detailed three dimensional picture of the injury, including damage to tissue and blood vessels caused by the broken bone. The doctor then looks over the computer's recommended course of action and signs off on it. The patient is then sent to surgery where the surgeon adds a few refinements to the computer generated plan.

In the operating room the woman is sedated and her leg is immobilized. A robot surgeon will then set the bone and repair any other damage to the leg - while a human doctor and nurse observe ready to step in if required. The leg will then be placed in a rigid cast and the woman will spend the next few days in a hospital room while bone regenerators heal the fracture.

A few days later she leaves the hospital with her leg as strong or stronger than it was before. While it is impossible to estimate the dollar amount of the bill for this treatment I very much doubt that it will be more, in 1950 dollars, than the 2009 bill. But look at how much better the outcome for the patient!

But what if we adopt Obama's plan for government run health care? What will a 76-year-0ld woman with a broken leg face in 2050?

The doctor will set the bone and put her leg in a cast. The bone will take the better part of a year to heal and will never be the same. During this time her mobility will be so severely restricted that she will not be able to live at home alone. So she will have to go to a nursing home where she will probably spend the rest of her life. But the doctor's bill for setting the leg and applying the cast would have only been a few hundred dollars - in 1950 dollars.

This assumes that the hospital's rationing panel (we won't call it the "death panel") doesn't decide that at her age she (who will never again pay income taxes) simply isn't worth the money to treat. Then she will be put in a bed and given morphine until she stops breathing. The bill for that will be under a hundred bucks.

The problem with a government solution to anything is that government is a piss-poor innovator. Let the government decide that something is so important that the private sector cannot be trusted to run it and whatever "it" is becomes frozen in time. It cannot be otherwise when a powerful entrenched bureaucracy has a massive vested interest in keeping things exactly as they are.

Someone suggested this thought experiment. Imagine that some visionary in government had looked at Henry Ford's Model T and realized how important the automobile would be to America's future. Suppose that this visionary had been able to convince the legislature and the president that the development and manufacture of cars was too important to be left to the profit-seeking private sector.

You don't have to imagine what the result would have been. All you need do is look back to East Germany before the Wall fell and remember how an East German could spend his fifteen years on the waiting list dreaming about what he would do when he took possession of his new Trabant.

Some things are too critically important to be taken out of the hands of the private sector. Our health care is one of them."

National Gun Registry

2009-09-30T18:53:00.000-07:00

Dr. Paul Broun, U.S. Congressman, Republican (GA-10), has sent out an email which came to me via Townhall.com containing information on House bill H.R. 45--Obama's gun control package. Among other things, this bill would establish a national gun registry database of every gun and its owner for the whole country. According to the email, "Your private information and every gun you own would be in the system."

It also bans all private firearms sales.

Big Brother is coming after our guns.

The Most Oppressive Tyranny

2009-09-23T05:31:00.000-07:00

“Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victim may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated, but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”–C.S. Lewis

Look for this one to go in the sidebar soon.

Change Is Coming

2009-09-23T05:11:00.000-07:00

Wihin a week or two The River will undergo a few changes. Primarily this means it will become a team blog. And, though the main course will still be politics and ideology, the banquet will also include side dishes of pop culture commentary, Christian apologetics, and, hopefully, some regular features. Obviously, some of this is beyond my range of expertise which is why I am calling in some help.

As for the look and feel of the new place, it will be essentially the same. I like the color scheme and the menagerie of faces and the quotations in the sidebar. So, though the address will be slightly different, the page will look the same, sort of. I will also leave a permanent link here so that the new abode can be easily found.

Look for the regular posting to continue until then.

Krauthammer on Van Jones and Linguistic Salt

2009-09-17T19:06:00.000-07:00

I like Charles Krauthammer for more than just his ability to turn a phrase and make a solid point. Krauthammer does not mind going against the grain of popular Republican or conservative thought on a given topic. When I go to one of his columns I know that I am not just going to get the standard Republican fare regurgitated into soundbytes like I might get were I to tune in to Sean Hannity, for example. Krauthammer gives me something original and causes me to think. For that, I recommend you read him regularly.

Here is an excerpt from his column from September 11 entitled "The Van Jones Matter":

So Van Jones, the defenestrated White House green-jobs czar, once called Republicans "assholes." Big deal. I've said worse about Democrats. I've said worse about Republicans. I've said worse about members of my family (you know who you are).

How prissy have we become? Are we allowed no salt in our linguistic diets?

Having once written a column praising Vice President Cheney's pithy deployment of the F-word -- on the floor of the Senate, no less -- I rise in defense of Jones. True, Jones's particular choice of epithet had none of the one-syllable concision, the onomatopoeic suggestiveness, the explosive charm of Cheney's. But you don't fire a guy for style.

I recommend the whole column, of course, which is here.

45% of Doctors Would Consider Quitting

2009-09-16T21:14:00.000-07:00

And 65% of doctors oppose ObamaCare according to a poll published today in Investor's Business Daily.

Major findings included:

• Two-thirds, or 65%, of doctors say they oppose the proposed government expansion plan. This contradicts the administration's claims that doctors are part of an "unprecedented coalition" supporting a medical overhaul.

It also differs with findings of a poll released Monday by National Public Radio that suggests a "majority of physicians want public and private insurance options," and clashes with media reports such as Tuesday's front-page story in the Los Angeles Times with the headline "Doctors Go For Obama's Reform."

Nowhere in the Times story does it say doctors as a whole back the overhaul. It says only that the AMA — the "association representing the nation's physicians" and what "many still regard as the country's premier lobbying force" — is "lobbying and advertising to win public support for President Obama's sweeping plan."

The AMA, in fact, represents approximately 18% of physicians and has been hit with a number of defections by members opposed to the AMA's support of Democrats' proposed health care overhaul.

• Four of nine doctors, or 45%, said they "would consider leaving their practice or taking an early retirement" if Congress passes the plan the Democratic majority and White House have in mind.

Can anyone say Atlas Shrugged?

Jimmy Carter Plays the Race Card

2009-09-16T20:35:00.000-07:00

America's worst hack President on critics of America's first black President:

Nothing says "decorum" like a Georgia hack playing the race card to get air time on television, especially when it's an ex-President who will probably go down in history as America's worst (but Obama isn't done yet.)

Note to self: be sure to take time to make fun of the Georgia peanut farmer every once in a while just to fight off boredom.

ACORN, Murder, Prostitution, and Obama

2009-09-15T19:51:00.000-07:00

Just when you thought you had heard it all, along comes the San Bernadino, California, office of ACORN. This video crosses into new areas of government-funded depravity and felonious behavior.

WARNING: CONTENTS ADVISORY: This woman drops the f-bomb at one point in the video. Don't say you weren't warned.

The most insidious thing about all this is how far the tentacles of ACORN reach into the Obama administration. In many ways, Obama is ACORN and ACORN is Obama. This is not to say that Obama is as corrupt as the people in these videos. But this is the organization with which he proudly associates himself (or has up until now).

For a thorough documentation of Obama's ties to ACORN, see Stanley Kurtz's article at National Review On-line here.

Obama: “I’ve been fighting alongside Acorn on issues you care about my entire career. Even before I was an elected official, when I ran Project Vote voter registration drive in Illinois, Acorn was smack dab in the middle of it, and we appreciate your work.”

Charlie Gibson - Derelict or Dishonest?

2009-09-15T18:46:00.000-07:00

The ACORN videos have been available on-line and reported on by Fox News television for nearly a week. It has been the hot topic on talk radio for several news cycles. There have been interviews, scripted statements, firings, threats of lawsuits, you name it. Yesterday, the U.S. Senate took action, adopting an amendment to a transportation and HUD appropriations bill that would de-fund ACORN.

But from ABC, NBC, and CBS? Silence. The New York Times? Nothing. The Washington Post? Not a peep.

If it does not fit the template, big media ignores it.

Big media bias has been well-documented for decades. They used to at least pretend objectivity, but even that is now out the window. They are no longer biased, they are active propagandists.

And their deportment exhudes hubris. If they do not report it, then it is not news-worthy. Obviously.

Enter Charlie Gibson on a radio interview this morning in Chicago. Here is the transcript:

Don: Ok here’s my question, Senate bill yesterday passes cutting off funds to this group called ACORN. Now we got the…we got that bill passing, we got the embarrassing video of ACORN staff giving tax advice on how to set up a brothel with 13 year old hookers. It has everything you could want corruption and sleazy action at tax funded organizations that’s got government ties. But nobody’s covering that story why?

Charlie Gibson: (laugh) I don’t even know about it. Uh, so you got me at a loss, I don’t know. Uh, uh, but, but My goodness if it’s got everything including sleaziness in it we should talk about it this morning.

Roma: This is the American way…

Charlie Gibson: Well maybe, maybe that’s one you just leave to the cables.

Roma: Well I think that this is a huge issue because there’s so much funding that goes into this organization and it’s a multi…

Charlie Gibson: Well, I know we’ve done some stories about ACORN before but uh, uh this one I don’t know about.

Roma: Jake Tapper did some blogging on it. I know he’s at least blogged once on this scandal.

Charlie Gibson: You guys, you guys are really up on the uh on the website.

For audio click here.

So here we have the news anchor for ABC news. If anyone is going to be the last one to know about something it is not going to be him, right? I mean, we're talking about Charlie Gibson, not Ron Burgundy. Aren't we?

Or maybe he is Ron Burgundy. Either that or we have a blatant ideologue masquerading as an objective news anchor. Those are our choices. But objective, intelligent news anchor? That is not a conclusion we can draw with any credibility. Charlie, himself, does not leave us that option.

Pelosi Apologize?

2009-09-15T05:45:00.000-07:00

You gotta love Limbaugh. This from yesterday's program:

"If I were Joe Wilson, I would say, 'I'll apologize as soon as Pelosi apologizes to the CIA.'"

Obama Stage a Coup?

2009-09-14T13:52:00.000-07:00

I have heard rumblings of this over the last few months. It is a reflection, I think, of the growing fear that regular Americans have of government, and the immense swing to the left that Obama has attempted to take us on in his first few months in office. Add to that Obama's radical associations and the Chicago-style one-party politics that are Obama's forte, plus the fact that he stubbornly marches forward with his agenda in spite of the overwhelming opposition of the population at large, and you have ample reason for many people to entertain these fears.

But, says Bruce Walker at American Thinker, these fears are not likely to materialize. Here is his column. (or go here)

Some conservatives have begun to openly wonder if Obama is going to seize power in America. Would he want to do this? Perhaps so (a scary thought, but he has promised change.) No one dreamed that Carter, the worst president of the last century, wanted or planned to seize power. Clinton wanted to win power, but the worst anyone expected of Clinton was Huey Long bossism.

Obama rose in politics through the thoroughly corrupt one-party government of Chicago. His spiritual advisor sounds like a rabble-rousing storm trooper. His intellectual mentor, Saul Alinksy, like the Bolsheviks and Nazis, believed in state terrorism. If Obama wanted to follow their leads, could he? I believe not.

Once it became clear that Obama was acting without any pretense of constitutionality, he would need muscle to back him up. Yet the greatest source of that muscle, the United States Military, loathes Obama as much as he loathes them. He would need intelligence, yet his maltreatment of the CIA ensures that those operatives would toss more bananas peels in front of him than real information should he make an extraconstitutional move.

Obama would also need the police, yet the President’s comments about a Cambridge policeman, a member of what has to be among the most politically correct force in America, shows the natural antipathy between Obama and law enforcement officers. The police, “pigs,” to the crowd that Obama belonged to as a community organizer, cannot be a solid support of any seizure of power.

What about the civilian national security force promised by Obama during the campaign? Conservatives are much more likely to be veterans and own guns than leftists. The creation and coordination of a real civilian army would also profoundly antagonize all state and local police forces.

Our federal system still exists, although states’ rights have declined greatly, but state governments still exercise real power (as several governors demonstrated in rejecting stimulus funds.) Nazis, Soviets, and Fascists all had to first crush federalism before gaining absolute power. States founded America, something almost unique among nations – state governments still have a special role in our United States. Crushing states completely would be very hard and very risky.

Beginning a coup or a revolution from above, as some fear Obama may do, also presumes that the revolution will end in a certain direction. If Obama and his elitist cohorts began a revolution, it would surely end: but how? Not only are the military, the CIA, and the police generally disgusted with Obama, but the ideological sentiment of the American people is profoundly out of step with Obama.

In every single state of the nation, according to a recent Gallup Poll, conservatives outnumber liberals. Consistently over the last decade, including the most recent, Battleground Poll, sixty percent of Americans call themselves conservatives. It is impossible to imagine conservatives support a leftist coup or revolution from above.

But the problem for Obama would extend beyond that. Attempting something like a seizure of power could be expected to alienate vast numbers of moderates and many self-defined liberals as well. Probably three-quarters or more of Americans would oppose any practical effort to end democracy, suspend civil rights, or end the Constitution which was open and clear.

Even his political party would have nightmares about any attempt by Obama to seize political power. The consequences of failure, which would be likely, could be a conservative counter-revolution. More likely, though, would be an electoral nightmare for Democrats which would last for decades. This is why a seizure of power is unheard of in the English-speaking democracies of Britain, Canada, America, Australia, and New Zealand.

The British Parliament, in which the Labour Party has huge majorities, has the theoretical power to pass a law which ended the requirement for new elections at least every five years. The Labour Party could simply make its power permanent. This would not even be an unconstitutional seizure of power. Yet no one believes Prime Minister Brown would ever propose that or that he could persuade his party to accept that. Even though he will be thoroughly trounced in the next general election, there will be an election in about nine months.

Politicians need elections just like lawyers need lawsuits. Without contested elections, Congress becomes as irrelevant as the Reichstag after Hitler got the Enabling Act passed. So even Obama's own party, or much of it, would oppose a seizure of power.

Finally, if Obama attempted an effective seizure of power and provoked a real national revolution, the repercussions for Democrats and the left in a successful counter-revolution could lead to a second American revolution in which vast amounts of political power could be explicitly returned to the states, the role of government in our lives precisely defined, the semi-divine status of judges overthrown, and power returned to the people.

Could the leftist choke hold on the media prevent a new revolution? Well, the left has tried to stop the Tea Party movement and the Town Hall protests with no success at all. Polling data shows the increasing ineffectiveness of the establishment media in controlling American’s thinking and actions.

Obama is not going to try to seize power, because he would fail utterly and damn his precious radicalism for decades in America. What he will do is what his predecessors on the left have done: acquire power through Fabian tactics; win one battle (like increasing union bosses’ power) and then move to the next lever of power in government and society. That is the dangerous path we have been on for many decades. We need to fight the very real enemies, not imaginary ones.

For an alternative viewpoint (sort of) click here.

More on the ACORN Statement and Lawsuit Threat

2009-09-14T11:27:00.000-07:00

John Fund, columnist for the Wall Street Journal, had this to say on Fox News.

Now, here's Fund writing in the Wall Street Journal:

I thought I'd heard every possible charge about corruption at ACORN, a feisty, union-backed activist group that became infamous last year when it was investigated for voter registration fraud in 15 states. Just yesterday, 11 ACORN workers were accused by Florida prosecutors of falsifying information on some 900 voter registration forms.

But this morning brings a Fox News report that ACORN officials in Baltimore offered to help get a housing loan and falsify tax documents for a proposed house of prostitution that would employ underage girls from El Salvador. The episode was captured on tape by an undercover filmmaker, James O'Keefe, who wanted to see just how far ACORN would go. Watching the tape -- which can be seen at Biggovernment.com -- is a creepy experience. ACORN itself has told Fox News the episode represents "gotcha journalism" but wouldn't comment further until it sees the full tape.

In helping Mr. O'Keefe set up his supposed brothel, ACORN employees also invited him to attend an August conference the group was holding for prospective home-buyers. But it linked attendance to Mr. O'Keefe joining ACORN and paying $120 in annual dues: "We ask that you join ACORN." The problem is that such a request is illegal, since the ACORN housing conferences are underwritten by federal government grants. ACORN has a political arm, so insisting that attendees at its housing conferences join the group and pay dues is a no-no.

It was precisely that kind of activity that got ACORN in trouble during the Clinton administration. The Inspector General of AmeriCorps, the government's volunteer agency, accused the group of "using government resources to promote legislation." ACORN was stripped of its federal grant as a result.

This past March, Senator David Vitter, a Louisiana Republican, tried to block ACORN from receiving additional federal funds when he proposed restrictions on federal support of the group. Senator Barbara Mikulski, a Maryland Senator whose state hosts the office featured in the undercover video reported by Fox, dismissed the idea: "I think this is an amendment that has no purpose and has Draconian consequences if passed." The Senate voted against Mr. Vitter's amendment by 53 to 43, with only two Democrats -- Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Robert Byrd of West Virginia --voting to restrict ACORN funding.

In light of the Fox video, Mr. Vitter should revive his amendment -- pronto.

--John Fund

Now, another Republican senator has introduced an amendment to defund ACORN.

9/12 Washington D.C. Tea Party Rally

2009-09-14T07:00:00.000-07:00

From the Columbia Independent Examiner:

Saturday's "Tea Party" rally in Washington, D.C. may have far exceeded almost all expectations. According to individual reports on the internet late Saturday The National Park Service had reportedly estimated around 1.2 million people attended the rally. There is no mention of the rally on the Park Service website and I have been unable to confirm that they have released any official estimate.

Some websites citing the 1.2 million number have claimed to be quoting Park Service employees, but I can find no direct quotes from anyone connected to the Park Service that can be confirmed at this time. Phone calls to the NPS went unanswered on Sunday.

There were also several reports Saturday saying that ABC and Fox News had reported that the crowd was estimated to be as high as 2 million. ABC News is now saying they never reported that number. According to ABC they were misquoted by a rally speaker. At this time there is no report on the Fox News website that includes an estimated attendance figure.

Some liberal websites and blogs are putting the number much lower, with estimates ranging anywhere from 20,000 to 70,000. Based on photographs and video footage of the event the numbers would appear to be much larger than those estimates. The ticketed area of the National Mall alone has a capacity of 240,000 and the crowd clearly filled that area and beyond. The public access area of the Mall holds nearly 950,000 and photographs of that area show it to be at or near capacity, although it has been reported that other groups were holding events in that area.

There was also this gem of a paragraph in the article:

On Friday the White House claimed they had no idea the rally was even planned. A ridiculous assertion that shows how dismissive the Obama administration and the Democrat-led Congress are of those who oppose their agenda. It is impossible to believe that President Obama knew nothing of the event. The denial is a perfect example of why the President is losing the trust of many Americans. He stretches his credibility to its limits, and beyond.

ACORN Scandal III (New York, New York)

2009-09-14T06:08:00.000-07:00

Here is a brief synopsis of what has been going on over the weekend as chronicled by the blog at the center of the storm, Big Government.

Fox News has been the only major news organization in this country covering this scandal to any extent at all. No surprises there. The rest of these organizations have reduced themselves to propaganda arms for the DNC. This doesn't fit their template. Look for them to continue ignoring it until it becomes too big. For more click here.

ACORN chief organizer Bertha Lewis released a statement defending ACORN, attacking her detractors as frauds, and threatening legal action. I blogged on this already.

James O'Keefe demanded an apology from Bertha Lewis, stating in response to her threats of legal action against him, "Bring it on."

The UK Telegraph picked up the story that the American media has mostly ignored.

A Leftist pundit responded in typical leftist fashion--ignore the accusations, attack the messengers.

Then, this morning, over at Big Government, O'Keefe quoted Bertha Lewis . . .

This recent scam, which was attempted in San Diego, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Philadelphia to name a few places, had failed for months before the results we’ve all recently seen.
-Bertha Lewis, Chief Organizer, ACORN

. . . before dropping two more bombs.

ACORN Responds - Bertha Lewis

2009-09-14T05:58:00.000-07:00

From Bertha Lewis, chief organizer of the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN):

The relentless attacks on ACORN’s members, its staff and the policies and positions we promote are unprecedented. An international entertainment conglomerate, disguising itself as a “news” agency (Fox), has expended millions, if not tens of millions of dollars, in their attempt to destroy the largest community organization of Black, Latino, poor and working class people in the country. It is not coincidence that the most recent attacks have been launched just when health care reform is gaining traction. It is clear they’ve had these tapes for months.

We are their Willy Horton for 2009. We are the boogeyman for the right-wing and its echo chambers. If ACORN did not exist, the right-wing would have needed to create us in order to achieve their agenda, their missions, their ideal, retrograde America. This recent scam, which was attempted in San Diego, Los Angeles, Miami, New York, Philadelphia to name a few places, had failed for months before the results we’ve all recently seen. I am appalled and angry; I cannot and I will not defend the actions of the workers depicted in the video, who have since been terminated. But it is clear that the videos are doctored, edited, and in no way the result of the fabricated story being portrayed by conservative activist “filmmaker” O’Keefe and his partner in crime. And, in fact, a crime it was – our lawyers believe a felony – and we will be taking legal action against Fox and their co-conspirators.

We will not be intimidated by this international conglomerate, which has made as its mission the destruction of our organization. ACORN members are committed to the empowerment of their communities – Black, Latino, poor, and working class – at the deepest level. We are an organization committed to halting the foreclosure crisis and keeping people in their homes. We are an organization committed to ensuring quality, affordable health care for every American. We are an organization that will not be stopped in our commitment to our members and our communities which has included:

Read it for yourself on their webpage. Click here.

Icarus, Daedalus, and Barack Obama

2009-09-11T20:09:00.000-07:00

Charles Krauthammer has an excellent op-ed piece on the decline of President Obama's poll numbers. Here it is, and be sure to check his columns in the Washington Post regularly:

Obama, the Mortal

By Charles Krauthammer
Friday, September 4, 2009

What happened to President Obama? His wax wings having melted, he is the man who fell to earth. What happened to bring his popularity down further than that of any new president in polling history save Gerald Ford (post-Nixon pardon)?

The conventional wisdom is that Obama made a tactical mistake by farming out his agenda to Congress and allowing himself to be pulled left by the doctrinaire liberals of the Democratic congressional leadership. But the idea of Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi pulling Obama left is quite ridiculous. Where do you think he came from, this friend of Chávista ex-terrorist William Ayers, of PLO apologist Rashid Khalidi, of racialist inciter Jeremiah Wright?

But forget the character witnesses. Just look at Obama's behavior as president, beginning with his first address to Congress. Unbidden, unforced and unpushed by the congressional leadership, Obama gave his most deeply felt vision of America, delivering the boldest social democratic manifesto ever issued by a U.S. president. In American politics, you can't get more left than that speech and still be on the playing field.

In a center-right country, that was problem enough. Obama then compounded it by vastly misreading his mandate. He assumed it was personal. This, after winning by a mere seven points in a year of true economic catastrophe, of an extraordinarily unpopular Republican incumbent, and of a politically weak and unsteady opponent. Nonetheless, Obama imagined that, as Fouad Ajami so brilliantly observed, he had won the kind of banana-republic plebiscite that grants caudillo-like authority to remake everything in one's own image.

Accordingly, Obama unveiled his plans for a grand makeover of the American system, animating that vision by enacting measure after measure that greatly enlarged state power, government spending and national debt. Not surprisingly, these measures engendered powerful popular skepticism that burst into tea-party town-hall resistance.

Obama's reaction to that resistance made things worse. Obama fancies himself tribune of the people, spokesman for the grass roots, harbinger of a new kind of politics from below that would upset the established lobbyist special-interest order of Washington. Yet faced with protests from a real grass-roots movement, his party and his supporters called it a mob -- misinformed, misled, irrational, angry, unhinged, bordering on racist. All this while the administration was cutting backroom deals with every manner of special interest -- from drug companies to auto unions to doctors -- in which favors worth billions were quietly and opaquely exchanged.

"Get out of the way" and "don't do a lot of talking," the great bipartisan scolded opponents whom he blamed for creating the "mess" from which he is merely trying to save us. If only they could see. So with boundless confidence in his own persuasiveness, Obama undertook a summer campaign to enlighten the masses by addressing substantive objections to his reforms.

Things got worse still. With answers so slippery and implausible and, well, fishy, he began jeopardizing the most fundamental asset of any new president -- trust. You can't say that the system is totally broken and in need of radical reconstruction, but nothing will change for you; that Medicare is bankrupting the country, but $500 billion in cuts will have no effect on care; that you will expand coverage while reducing deficits -- and not inspire incredulity and mistrust. When ordinary citizens understand they are being played for fools, they bristle.

After a disastrous summer -- mistaking his mandate, believing his press, centralizing power, governing left, disdaining citizens for (of all things) organizing -- Obama is in trouble.

Let's be clear: This is a fall, not a collapse. He's not been repudiated or even defeated. He will likely regroup and pass some version of health insurance reform that will restore some of his clout and popularity.

But what has occurred -- irreversibly -- is this: He's become ordinary. The spell is broken. The charismatic conjurer of 2008 has shed his magic. He's regressed to the mean, tellingly expressed in poll numbers hovering at 50 percent.

For a man who only recently bred a cult, ordinariness is a great burden, and for his acolytes, a crushing disappointment. Obama has become a politician like others. And like other flailing presidents, he will try to salvage a cherished reform -- and his own standing -- with yet another prime-time speech.

But for the first time since election night in Grant Park, he will appear in the most unfamiliar of guises -- mere mortal, a treacherous transformation to which a man of Obama's supreme self-regard may never adapt.

(pictures added by The River.)

ACORN Scandal II (Double Your Pleasure, Double Your Fun)

2009-09-11T19:19:00.000-07:00

Just when ACORN (and CNN) was in the process of explaining how the alleged video tape may have been edited in a politically advantageous way by some right-wing hacks, was only a product of "gotcha" journalism, and how that one particular incident was surely an isolated incident, and how it could not possily be something endemic to the system they have in place, James O'Keefe produces another, this time in the Washington D.C. office of ACORN.

And . . .

Once again, your tax dollars at work. This is Washington D.C.

For more, see the entire post at Big Government.

The Bizarro World of Babylon D.C.

2009-09-10T18:52:00.000-07:00

Only in Washington D.C., where the real world and the ethos of the common people seldom enter, could the spectacle of last night and this morning have taken place. As I contemplate these things, it causes me to muse on that magical, mystical place . . .

We shall call this chimerical city Babylon D.C. Behold its mystery and mayhem!

First, we have King Barack I, whose wardrobe consists of the world's finest oratory. A quick check with the opinions of all the smartest and most beautiful people will squelch any doubts about that. Just ask them. These, in fact, whether one asks them or not, are always at the ready to remind us of that indisputable point. Barack I is the finest orator to have ever ascended the throne of Babylon D.C. To say otherwise, to doubt such hyperbolic orthodoxy, is akin to saying he has no clothes on at all!

Next, we have the Democrats, champions of the people! These brave heroes never miss an opportunity to stand up for fairness, justice, and the little guy, thumbing their considerable noses at special interest groups, big corporations, and evil right-wing Nazis like Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin. Truth is their Gibraltor and they will fashion that Gibraltor on their potter's wheel into whatever form best suits their political ends. We might point out that one cannot be a champion of the people while robbing individuals of their rights and property, but in doing this we prove ourselves to be just the mind-numbed minions of Rush Limbaugh. We should learn to think for ourselves . . . think like Democrats! We must be at one with the beautiful and important people. Watch them as they hail the great leader!

And watch the Republicans follow suit! Those evil neo-cons are always trying to destroy our democracy by standing in the way of the smart and beautiful people. They dare to offer an alternative--themselves as the wiser, safer central planners. They seek to show us a better way. "Let us grow government, yes," say they, "but let us grow it leaner and more efficiently, and in slower increments." We might point out to them that the end result is still the same, a bloated distortion of the founders' intent, but they only respond, "Reagan! Reagan! I was a foot soldier with Reagan!" And so they applaud the great leader as well, and admire his fine clothing.

Behind King Barack I sits Lady Pelosi, Duchess of Ditz. She wanly smiles, fearing to overdo it lest the royal botox injections should be stressed at the overmuch pressure. Above all things, Lady Pelosi desires, nay lusts, to obtain and to wield Barack's scepter, to take his reins and turn him in whatever direction she chooses. It is her agenda he is pushing, or is it vise versa? Who wields the scepter when it is just the two of them behind the scenes?

And for what reason has this regal assemblage been called? Is it a call to war? Is the kingdom at stake? Must some catastrophe be averted? It is all three. This coven has gathered to expose and then cast out that infernal disease, that enemy of the state, corporate greed, along with its sibling, profit, and its progenitor, irresponsibility (that wicked criminal which has ever haunted us under the pseudonym freedom.)

Silence ensues as King Barack pauses to begin his speech. The willing crowd is mesmerized at his electrifying elocution, his dynamic diction, his resounding rhetoric. A thought pops into someone's head . . . this guy is wholly dependent on the telepromptor, what would, what could he do without it? But the thought is quickly squelched and evaporates into the oblivion as kingly rhetoric overcomes it.

"Black is not black," says the King. "It is white."

Everyone cheers.

"There are those who have been saying that black is black. Such in-sophisticants do not deserve our time nor attention. Nevertheless, they have poisoned the minds of many with their mis-information. Their words are false and deleterious. These are just pushing their corporate agenda. They are against reform just for the sake of being against reform. They make up facts. I am not just speaking of rancorous radio hosts or nefarious news programs on cable television. I am speaking even of politicians. In short, they lie." His mind's eye reaches out to the wicked witch of Alaska as he says it. "But I'm here to tell you tonight that black is white, has always been white, and never will be otherwise, not as long as I am king. Moreover, it is free! It will never cost anyone anything!"

"You lie!" hollers a young knave from the gallery.

Everyone stops. The king pauses, stutters, mumbles, then goes on. Botox bubbles appear on the rosy cheeks of Lady Pelosi seated behind the king. But, the moment is lost.

Finally the Liar is finished with his speech. The great assembly of liars and thieves is delighted. We shall work together. We shall overcome. We shall create utopia! But not until that young and foolish villain is brought under the iron fist, forced to bow the knee!

Before anyone can think what to do, old general McCrotchety speaks up and speaks out against such insolence as was brazenly and doltishly displayed by the upstart Congressman. He demands an apology.

And, thus, the young scallywag is brought forward and forced to submit, under the guise of decorum, as truth and integrity are assiduously ignored.

And so all the earls and dukes with their royal knights and ladies attendant leave, lying to each other about what has taken place, how important they all are, how great was their king's oratory, and how much good has been done for the people, while the lone honest man is censured.

Welcome to Babylon, D.C.

ACORN Scandal

2009-09-10T10:46:00.000-07:00

These are the people who helped put Obama in office. These are the people before whom our beloved leader gave a speech proclaiming fidelity, thanking them for their tireless efforts on his behalf, promising to help push their radical agenda forward. This is a group which has received millions in federal tax dollars and is poised to receive billions more as a political payback from Congress and Obama through the stimulus package. This is your tax dollars at work.

Warning: the following videos contain conversations about prostitution and other criminal activities.

This is what Washington D.C. has become. For more info go to Big Government.

About That Speech Last Night

2009-09-10T10:28:00.001-07:00

Thomas Sowell published a beautiful and poignant op-ed piece yesterday before our great leader's health care address to Congress and the nation. Now that you've had a night's sleep and a few hours this morning to help you digest that diabolical little morsel of oratory, how about washing it down with some truth from the pen of Thomas Sowell. Joe Wilson was not the only one calling Obama a liar yesterday.

From Thomas Sowell:

Listening to a Liar

The most important thing about what anyone says are not the words themselves but the credibility of the person who says them.

The words of convicted swindler Bernie Madoff were apparently quite convincing to many people who were regarded as knowledgeable and sophisticated. If you go by words, you can be led into anything.

No doubt millions of people will be listening to the words of President Barack Obama Wednesday night when he makes a televised address to a joint session of Congress on his medical care plans. But, if they think that the words he says are what matters, they can be led into something much worse than being swindled out of their money.

One plain fact should outweigh all the words of Barack Obama and all the impressive trappings of the setting in which he says them: He tried to rush Congress into passing a massive government takeover of the nation's medical care before the August recess— for a program that would not take effect until 2013!

Whatever President Obama is, he is not stupid. If the urgency to pass the medical care legislation was to deal with a problem immediately, then why postpone the date when the legislation goes into effect for years— more specifically, until the year after the next Presidential election?

If this is such an urgently needed program, why wait for years to put it into effect? And if the public is going to benefit from this, why not let them experience those benefits before the next Presidential election?

If it is not urgent that the legislation goes into effect immediately, then why don't we have time to go through the normal process of holding Congressional hearings on the pros and cons, accompanied by public discussions of its innumerable provisions? What sense does it make to "hurry up and wait" on something that is literally a matter of life and death?

If we do not believe that the President is stupid, then what do we believe? The only reasonable alternative seems to be that he wanted to get this massive government takeover of medical care passed into law before the public understood what was in it.

Moreover, he wanted to get re-elected in 2012 before the public experienced what its actual consequences would be.

Unfortunately, this way of doing things is all too typical of the way this administration has acted on a wide range of issues.

Consider the "stimulus" legislation. Here the administration was successful in rushing a massive spending bill through Congress in just two days— after which it sat on the President's desk for three days, while he was away on vacation. But, like the medical care legislation, the "stimulus" legislation takes effect slowly.

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that it will be September 2010 before even three-quarters of the money will be spent. Some economists expect that it will not all be spent by the end of 2010.

What was the rush to pass it, then? It was not to get that money out into the economy as fast as possible. It was to get that money— and the power that goes with it— into the hands of the government. Power is what politics is all about.

The worst thing that could happen, from the standpoint of those seeking more government power over the economy, would be for the economy to begin recovering on its own while months were being spent debating the need for a "stimulus" bill. As the President's chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, said, you can't let a crisis "go to waste" when "it's an opportunity to do things you could not do before."

There are lots of people in the Obama administration who want to do things that have not been done before— and to do them before the public realizes what is happening.

The proliferation of White House "czars" in charge of everything from financial issues to media issues is more of the same circumvention of the public and of the Constitution. Czars don't have to be confirmed by the Senate, the way Cabinet members must be, even though czars may wield more power, so you may never know what these people are like, until it is too late.

What Barack Obama says Wednesday night is not nearly as important as what he has been doing— and how he has been doing it.

McCain Should Apologize

2009-09-09T19:42:00.001-07:00

John McCain is already calling for Rep. Joe Wilson of South Carolina to apologize for his outburst during the speech that Generalissimo Obama made before a joint session of Congress about two hours ago. As already noted, Congressman Wilson hollered "You lie!" when Obama was lying about how government-run health care's public option would not be available for illegal aliens in any way. McCain said the outburst was embarassing and that Joe should apologize immediately.

As a representative of American liberty, I also would like to call on a Congressman to apologize immediately. I would like to call on Senator John McCain to apologize for a long record of compromising with those who would rob us of liberty and property, and also for running one of the most inept political campaigns in American presidential history, arguably helping our marxist great leader Obama become President.

Senator, you should be ashamed. Apologize.

"The General Welfare" (re-visited)

2009-09-09T19:01:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I posted the following. After having done so I thought of some additional comments I wanted to make. You will find them at the end of this re-post.

"...promote the general welfare."

This little clause, found twice in the Constitution if I am not mistaken, is the favorite clause of the Left and the one used most often as a pretext to foist whatever form of wealth-redistributing, soft tyranny they wish upon the public. What did the founders, the actual writers of the Constitution, have to say about it?

First, James Madison.

James Madison, the Father of the Constitution, elaborated upon this limitation in a letter to James Robertson:
"With respect to the two words 'general welfare,' I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators. If the words obtained so readily a place in the 'Articles of Confederation,' and received so little notice in their admission into the present Constitution, and retained for so long a time a silent place in both, the fairest explanation is, that the words, in the alternative of meaning nothing or meaning everything, had the former meaning taken for granted."

"If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by money, and will promote the General Welfare, the Government is no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one...."
-- James Madison, letter to Edmund Pendleton, January 21, 1792

Now, Thomas Jefferson.

"Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but only those specifically enumerated."
--Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Albert Gallatin, 1817

It is worth noting that in the two founders I have quoted above we have both sides of the American political spectrum from the late 18th century represented.

That is, we have Madison who represents the Federalist party and who was one of the major contributors for The Federalist Papers, papers written in defense of federalism and for the adoption of the Constitution into law.

And we have Jefferson, who represents the Democratic-Republican party, the one opposed to the Federalist party.

So we have both sides of the political aisle in the late 18th and early 19th century, the time of the founding of the country, opposed to the modern idea that the "general welfare" clause should be used (abused) in the way it is today by many in both major parties.

Would you say we have drifted?

Would you say that to a man the founders would have stood against this sort of misuse of the Constitution to enable the federal government to do whatever it wanted? The only possible exception I can think of to that would have been Alexander Hamilton, and even he would have been far to the right of today's political center.

"You Lie!"--Obama's Offensive Oration

2009-09-09T18:36:00.000-07:00

"South Carolina Republican Rep. Joe Wilson shouted "You lie!" after Obama had talked about illegal immigrants." - Fox News article.

Say it ain't so, Joe!

I cannot wait to hear all the fallout from this, especially what Congressman Wilson has to say for himself about it later. I will say this, though. What did you expect, Joe? Of course, he lied. Leftists cannot be truthful about their agenda. If they are they will be rejected.

See here.

And here.

While that was the most interesting thing said at the speech, did anyone notice how deftly Obama tried to position his proposal as centrist, neither right nor left? Yes, he really believes he can get away with that.

And as predicted he simply denied some of the tougher allegations against his plan, no actual refutations necessary.

He did throw a bone to the right by offering to consider some retort reform in the future, but then he outright stated that he planned to take away liberty from millions of Americans by forcing them onto insurance plans that they do not want. Claiming their "irresponsible" behavior costs society too much, Obama cheerfully and unashamedly promised to rob them of liberty and property in the name of the greater good of the collective. Goodbye, liberty. Hello, tyranny.

Obama also noted that he was not the first President to attempt health care reform before adamantly stating that he would be the last. He has drawn a line in the sand. He will have his health care reform bill.

Obama's Speech Tonight

2009-09-09T11:44:00.000-07:00

I do not look for anything new here--no changes, no specifics, just the same lame generalities and denials. I will be, frankly, shocked to see anything more than that. There has been no depth to this administration thus far, why should we expect some now? We will get the same tired platitudes and an attempt to blame ignorance and right-wing instigators for all the dissent.

Pay attention and see if I am right about this . . . there will be no substantive refutation of any negative criticism of this plan--only denials. Because they are such rabid idealogues, they will not hesitate to lie with impunity to achieve their ultimate goals. The end always justifies the means with these patricians. Sheer arrogance leads Generalissimo Obama to believe that he can say anything he wants, no matter how patently absurd or obviously false, and because he is so eloquent and we plebians so dull, it will work. This is the plan.

Oh, they may change the labels again, as they have done several times already, but the substance will be the same--more government, less liberty, and the citizen be damned. The citizen doesn't know what's best for him anyway.

A denial is not a refutation.

This administration and Congress have been under relentless attack from the Right--not the Republicans who are still looking around cluelessly, wondering what in the world happened to them the last two election cycles--but from the Right. The Right has been leveling charge after charge against this bill and these accusations, because they have substance behind them, substance like specific page numbers in the house or senate bill, have rung true. If these charges were false and Obama were on the side of truth, then the best thing Obama could do to win the debate and persuade the citizenry of the rightness of his plan would be to argue it substantively, show where the accusations of the Right were either unfounded or misguided, and then speak plain truth to the people.

But he won't.

What he will do is libel the dissenters (ad hominem) and deny the accusations.

Again, a denial is not a refutation and his tactics demonstrate the weakness of their position.

Watch and see if I am right.

The General Welfare

2009-09-08T08:56:00.000-07:00

"...promote the general welfare."

This little clause, found twice in the Constitution if I am not mistaken, is the favorite clause of the Left and the one used most often as a pretext to foist whatever form of wealth-redistributing, soft tyranny they wish upon the public. What did the founders, the actual writers of the Constitution, have to say about it?

First, James Madison.

James Madison, the Father of the Constitution, elaborated upon this limitation in a letter to James Robertson:
"With respect to the two words 'general welfare,' I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators. If the words obtained so readily a place in the 'Articles of Confederation,' and received so little notice in their admission into the present Constitution, and retained for so long a time a silent place in both, the fairest explanation is, that the words, in the alternative of meaning nothing or meaning everything, had the former meaning taken for granted."

"If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by money, and will promote the General Welfare, the Government is no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one...."
-- James Madison, letter to Edmund Pendleton, January 21, 1792

Now, Thomas Jefferson.

"Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but only those specifically enumerated."
--Thomas Jefferson, Letter to Albert Gallatin, 1817

The American Form of Government

2009-09-08T08:41:00.000-07:00

I ran across this gem while looking around over at the home page of Walter E. Williams, columnist and professor of economics at George Mason University. I had to bring it here, and though it is ten minutes in length it is well done and most certainly worth your time.

I'm thinking of putting it permanently, somehow, on the front page here, perhaps at the bottom.

UK Doctors Question Treatment of Terminally Ill

2009-09-04T06:13:00.000-07:00

The powerful US Health Lobby is at it again, this time subjugating that right-wing mouthpiece (ahem), the Associated Press, and forcing them to promote their sinister propaganda. We hope that the people's best interests shall prevail over these powerful corporate interests. (ahem)

LONDON — A group of senior British doctors expressed concern Thursday about the treatment of the terminally ill, saying some people are dying prematurely because of guidelines for dealing with patients in their final hours.

In a letter to The Daily Telegraph newspaper, the six palliative care specialists criticized the "tick-box approach to the management of death" in guidelines used by hundreds of hospitals within Britain's universal health care system.

Britain's system has been at the center of debate at home and in the United States, where opponents of health care reform have used it to attack President Barack Obama's plan for national health insurance. U.S. conservatives have used the British system as a negative example, saying it provides rationed care and allows bureaucrats rather than doctors to make life-and-death decisions.

On Thursday, a leaked consultants' report recommended drastic cuts in the U.K.'s National Health Service to help cope with the ever-rising cost of supporting universal health care — a development that opponents of the U.S. health care reforms are likely to welcome.

Most in Britain defend their NHS, but complaints about bureaucracy are common.

Complete AP aticle is here.

But bureaucracy is so much more efficient . . . I'm still trying to figure it all out.

Property Rights: Who Owns You?

2009-09-03T11:55:00.000-07:00

In a free society, the answer to the above question should be obvious. The individual is the owner of and is responsible for himself. This is what was believed by the founders of this country and, for those of you who are Christians, this idea of individual responsibility is fundamental to your faith. You are responsible for your actions. You will give an account to God. No one will stand there with you in that day, including government.

Why, then, the question?

I ask the question because, increasingly, Americans are answering it in the same way it is answered in all the other countries of the world. The state owns you. And to an ever increasing degree, that is true.

If this sounds far-fetched to you, or if you would simply like an elaboration, I invite you to read this op-ed piece written by Walter Williams.

Here is an excerpt:

. . . In a free society, the question of who has the right to harm whom, by permitting rap music and smoking, is answered by the property rights question: Who owns the bar? In a socialistic society, such conflicting harms are resolved through government intimidation and coercion.

What about the right to harm oneself, such as the potential harm that can come from not wearing a seatbelt. That, too, is a property rights question. If you own yourself, you have the right to take chances with your own life. Some might argue that if you're not wearing a seatbelt and wind up a vegetable, society has to take care of you; therefore, the fascist threat "click it or ticket." Becoming a burden on society is not a problem of liberty and private property. It's a problem of socialism where one person is forced to take care of someone else. That being the case, the government, in the name of reducing health care costs, assumes part ownership of you and as such assumes a right to control many aspects of your life. That Americans have joyfully given up self-ownership is both tragic and sad.

Do you think that our founders would have turned over their rights of self-determination when it comes to medicine in exchange for a massive federal program which taxes people unequally in order to dole out mediocre benefits to all while taking freedom of choice away from them? Are we really ready to give up our rights for this mess of pottage?

The Collective vs. the Individual

2009-09-03T06:00:00.000-07:00

The heart and soul of the health care debate hinges on whether one holds to a theory of government which champions the collective or a theory of government which champions the individual. This is evident both from the arguments I have heard proposed on the radio and from a reading of my on-line discourse with our Aussie liberal friend.

Whether it is Marxism, fascism, fabian socialism, Eurpoean-style social democracy, or even old-style monarchial systems, a common thread runs through all. That is this. There are a few elite people, an aristocracy or an oligarchy, who are more qualified to make decisions for the masses than the individuals who make up those masses. This is the modern Left, ironic that it should be so because it is the fallback position of most human government throughout history.

The Right, in this country at least, seeks to steer government away from a collectivist mentality and back toward the innovations and ideals of the founders of this nation . . . Washington, Franklin, Jefferson, Madison, Adams, et.al. These men championed the rights of the individual over that of the collective.

At least this is what the Right is supposed to be about. In recent years, however, it has been more or less just a lighter version of the Left.

The collective . . . "The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few." Logical, is it not? At least Captain Spock thought so in Star Trek II, the Wrath of Khan. But then Admiral Kirk showed him the nobility of the opposite viewpoint in Star Trek III, the Search for Spock.

(Don't you just love Star Trek references?)

The arguments for nationalized health care all run along this theme. They are the product of a collectivist mindset. How can we (the smart people, the beautiful people, the ivy-league-set) make society a better place? They cite statistics to prove, ostensibly, that their system would work better for society as a whole. Nevermind that they trample on the rights of individuals. That's not important. Nevermind that they take away the decision-making ability of individuals, most people don't know what is best for them anyway do they?

This kind of thinking can be seen in articles like this piece from the Los Angeles Times in which it is lamented that the states most vehemently opposed to ObamaCare are those which stand to benefit most from it.

Freedom is a dangerous thing. Individuals who have freedom often act very stupidly with it. They are free to eat what they want, so they overindulge, become obese. The Leftist aristocracy comes along and says, "We have a problem in society--too much obesity. What shall we do?" Then, as if they have been appointed the caretakers of individuals, they seek legislative answers to subjugate the freedom of individuals and stop this obesity "problem." This is what happened with smoking. This is what is happening with health care, right now.

(By the way, it is patently stupid to cite statistics on the general health of a society and believe that the only cause affecting that general health is the medical industry. As Captain Spock might say, "That is illogical." There are many other factors involved, including genetics, environment, diet, daily activity, cultural practices . . . I could not possibly name them all. But such is the illogic of the Left.)

The collectivist, be he a European social democrat, an English monarch of old, or a Leninist from Moscow, would seek to improve society as a whole at the expense of individual liberty. The United States of America, in contrast, has historically been the safehouse of individual liberty. Whether or not this works out best for society as whole--according to the theories of some Harvard elites--is unimportant. In America, the rights of the individual have always been more important than the needs of the collective.

At least until now.

We shall see what this Congress and this President do, whether they will uphold American traditions and values and stop this madness, or whether they will stomp on individual rights and thus stomp on everything our founders believed.

Let us hope and pray for the former.

Ann Coulter Thrashes ObamaCare

2009-08-31T22:48:00.000-07:00

I love Ann Coulter. No, really. I absolutely love her. Okay, not in the same way that I love my wife. I just love the way Ann fearlessly, plain-spokenly, and skillfully rips through liberal lies and boldly, unashamedly stands for truth.

She has chosen to take on the liberal lies concerning this health care plan that Obama, Reid, and Pelosi are pushing in Congress right now. She cuts through their arguments like Excalibur through Mazola.

Here is Liberal Lies About National Health Care: First in a Series

and

Liberal Lies About National Health Care: Second in a Series (Collect all 10!)

Read them if you dare. Or just keep your head in the sand.

A "River" Reader Goes to a Town Hall Meeting

2009-08-31T21:30:00.000-07:00

One of our readers here at The River recently had the opportunity to attend a town hall meeting set up by his local representative to Congress, Sheila Jackson-Lee. He even got to ask a question, along with a follow-up.

Before I get into the story and tell you who it was, I just have to say that I thank the Lord God Almighty of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob that this woman is not my congressman (shudder). I am abundantly blessed to have, instead, Jeb Hensarling as a U.S. Rep. and he represents my viewpoint almost perfectly.

But not so blessed is our friend Allen Lewis, the Texas Conservative. Here is the story of his second trip to a town hall meeting and what took place there, including his questions to the distinguished Mrs. Jackson-Lee. (click here)

I'm just glad for our friend Mr. Lewis that Mrs. Jackson-Lee's mobile phone was apparently turned off this time and he was able to have her undivided attention, even if just for a few minutes.

For those of you too lazy to go over to his blog right now, I wanted to bring up a fabulous point that Mr. Lewis made to the congresswoman by quoting him here and then giving him a hearty "amen." Here is Mr. Lewis:

For me, I finally got to ask my question, which I did not get to do at the last meeting. I pointed out to her that Congress is not authorized in Article I, Section 8 of the US Constitution to operate a health care program. I asked her if she would sponsor an amendment to the Constitution which would reserve this power for the Congress.

Her answer was not really an answer so much as it was a skillful avoidance of the question. She stated that the government does many things which are not specifically allowed in the Constitution, and said that this was being done to “promote the general welfare” and “to form a more perfect union.”

My reply to her was that her interpretation of the general welfare clause essentially allowed for an arbitrary government, which naturally leads to tyranny. I also pointed out to her that from 2001-2009, she and other Democrats were rightfully angry at what they perceived to be arbitrary laws made by the Bush administration, such as the Patriot Act; and the unconstitutional abdication of the responsibility to declare war by the Congress.

She definitely agreed with me that the Patriot Act and the Iraq/Afghanistan wars were not Constitutional. Unfortunately I was way over my time, so I didn’t get to make my closing point which was: by her reasoning, if George W. Bush and the Congress said, “The Patriot Act is for the general welfare of the nation,” it immediately becomes Constitutional - no matter what the bill actually says or does.

I think that our friend, Mr. Lewis, thinks on a far deeper level than someone like Mrs. Jackson-Lee ever has. And his logic here is flawless. "Progressive" politicians have been abusing that little clause in the preamble since Theodore Roosevelt.

More Socialized Medicine Horrors Exposed

2009-08-27T11:02:00.000-07:00

From the UK Telegraph:

By Rebecca Smith, Medical Editor

'Cruel and neglectful' care of one million NHS patients exposed

One million NHS patients have been the victims of appalling care in hospitals across Britain, according to a major report released today. . . .

In the last six years, the Patients Association claims hundreds of thousands have suffered from poor standards of nursing, often with 'neglectful, demeaning, painful and sometimes downright cruel' treatment.
The charity has disclosed a horrifying catalogue of elderly people left in pain, in soiled bed clothes, denied adequate food and drink, and suffering from repeatedly cancelled operations, missed diagnoses and dismissive staff.

The Patients Association said the dossier proves that while the scale of the scandal at Mid-Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust - where up to 1,200 people died through failings in urgent care - was a one off, there are repeated examples they have uncovered of the same appalling standards throughout the NHS. . . .

To read further about the horrors of socialized medicine, click here.

Government. It's so wonderful. It can do so much for you.

Obamacare and the IRS

2009-08-27T10:57:00.000-07:00

From a CBS News Blog, posted by Declan McCullagh

One of the problems with any proposed law that's over 1,000 pages long and constantly changing is that much deviltry can lie in the details. Take the Democrats' proposal to rewrite health care policy, better known as H.R. 3200 or by opponents as "Obamacare." (Here's our CBS News television coverage.)

Section 431(a) of the bill says that the IRS must divulge taxpayer identity information, including the filing status, the modified adjusted gross income, the number of dependents, and "other information as is prescribed by" regulation. That information will be provided to the new Health Choices Commissioner and state health programs and used to determine who qualifies for "affordability credits."

To read the whole blogpost, click here.

Big Brother is watching.

Dick Morris on 'Death Panels'

2009-08-18T22:51:00.000-07:00

I'm on Dick Morris's email list so I get two or three things from him a week. Lately, he has been all over this health care debate and has really done yeoman's work to try to get this abominable legislation defeated. For the record, he and I would not always agree on what the role of government should be in our lives. Neither would I attack the Obama health care reform with the same aruments he does (keep in mind that Morris was the political brains behind the Clinton administration). But he makes some salient points in this op-ed piece published in the New York Post a day or two ago and I thought I would post that piece here. I do not know what the etiquette on re-posting this is, so I went ahead and included a couple of links at the end so you can check out his site, his youtube videos, and his book. I hope that makes it okay. Enjoy.

IT'S ALL A DEATH PANEL: THE TRUTH ABOUT OBAMACARE

By DICK MORRIS & EILEEN MCGANN

Published in the New York Post on August 17, 2009

Washington is all atwitter about "death panels": President Obama derides the idea that his health-care reform calls for them; the Senate is stripping "end of life" counseling language from its bill -- and last Friday the voice of the liberal establishment, The New York Times, ran a Page One story "rebutting" the rumor that ObamaCare would create such boards to decide when to pull the plug on elderly patients.

But all those protests miss the fundamental truth of the "death panel" charge.

Even without a federal board voting on whom to kill, ObamaCare will ration care extensively, leading to the same result. This follows inevitably from central features of the president's plan.

Specifically, his decisions to (1) pay for reform with vast cuts in the Medicare budget and (2) grant insurance coverage to 50 million new people, vastly boosting demand without increasing the supply of doctors, nurses or other care providers.

Whether or not he admits it even to himself, Obama's talk of cutting "inefficiencies" and reducing costs translates to less care, of lower quality, for the elderly. Every existing national health system finds ways to deny state-of-the-art medications and necessary surgical procedures to countless patients, and ObamaCare has the nascent mechanisms to do the same. With the limited options that Obama's vision would leave them, many will find that "end of life counseling" necessary and even welcome.

"Reform" would cut care to the elderly in several ways:

* Slash hundreds of billions from Medicare spending, largely by lowering reimbursement rates to doctors and hospitals for patient care.

If a hospital gets less money for each MRI, it will do fewer of them. If a surgeon gets paid less for a heart bypass on a Medicare patient, he'll perform them more rarely. These facts of the marketplace are not only inevitable consequences of Obama's cuts but are also its intended consequence. Without them, his savings will prove illusory.

* Expanding the patient load by extending full coverage to 50 million Americans (including such "Americans" as illegal immigrants) without boosting the supply of care will force rationing decisions on harried and overworked doctors and hospitals.

People with insurance use a lot more health-care resources -- so today's facilities and personnel will have to cope with the increased workload. Busy surgeons will have to decide who would benefit most from their treatment -- de facto rationing. The elderly will, inevitably, be the losers.

* The Federal Health Board, established by this legislation, will be charged with collecting data on various forms of treatment for different conditions to assess which are the most effective and efficient. While the bills don't force providers to obey the board's "guidance," its recommendations will still wind up setting the standards and protocols for care systemwide.

We've already seen Medicare and Medicaid lead a similar race to the bottom with their formularies and other regulations. With Washington dictating what every policy must cover and regulating all rates, insurers and providers will all have to follow the FHB's advice on limiting care to the elderly -- a de facto rationing system.

* In assessing whether to allow certain treatments to a given patient, medical professionals will be encouraged to apply the Quality-Adjusted Remaining Years system. Under QARY, decision-makers seek to "amortize" the cost of treatment over the remaining "quality years of life" likely for that patient.

Imagine a hip replacement costing $100,000 and the 75-year-old who needs it, a diabetic with a heart condition deemed to have just three "quality" years left. That works out to $33,333 a year -- too steep! Surgery disallowed! (Unless of course, the patient has political connections . . . )

Younger, healthier patients would still get the surgery, of course. The QARY system simply aims to deny health care to the oldest and most infirm, "scientifically" condemning them to infirmity, pain and earlier death than would otherwise be their fate.

In short, ObamaCare doesn't need to set up "death panels" to make retail decisions about ending the lives of individual patients. The whole "reform" scheme is one giant death panel in its own right.

Order a copy of CATASTROPHE - Go Here Now!

View Dick's videos on YouTube, Go Here Now!

The Bush Administration

2009-08-18T21:10:00.000-07:00

My dear readers (all four of you), if you come to this blog with the idea that I am an apologist for the Bush administration, or think that perhaps because I lambast Democrats in Congress and in the White House that means I approve of everything Bush did, then you are mistaken.

George W. Bush, like his father, was not a conservative.

Should I repeat that? I wish I did not have to, but I probably should because some people cannot seem to get an "us vs. them" mentality out of their heads. They read everything through that template.

George W. Bush, like his father, was not a conservative. Neither did I approve of everything he and his administration did.

One thing I appreciate about Bush is that he worked tirelessly after 9/11 to keep us safe and was successful in doing so. Thank-you, Mr. President, for that.

But, please. If your only response to a criticism of the Obama administration is to point out a foible of the last administration, or if you think that by pointing out some inconsistency in Bush you point out an inconsistency in my conservative/libertarian viewpoint, then you are, well, mistaken.

Maybe I should post something about how I'm no longer a Republican because they no longer represent my values--so that I can better get my point across. Wait. I already did that. Or maybe I should post something about how the Republicans will need to do more than just talk conservatively to win me back, like I did this very morning, and then you might get it.

Probably not.

So, while a response like, "Well, Bush did blah, blah, blah . . ." might impress your liberal friends, it really isn't an adequate response to any criticism of this administration, is it?

The People's Cube

2009-08-18T08:40:00.000-07:00

While surfing around the web this morning I ran across this gem of a blog. The People's Cube. I'm adding it to the sidebar. They are creative and funny and their wit hits home. These are some examples of what they did in a recent response to the White House solicitation of email addresses of those who were "spreading fishy misinformation" about Obama Care.

They even set up a website where they have a few items along this theme that you can purchase. Don't you just love the instincts of a good capitalist?

The People's Cube Store

Republican Resurgence?

2009-08-18T07:24:00.000-07:00

More than one GOP governor has been vocal, as of late, regarding the march to socialism going on in Washington right now. Political moves are being pondered and made in the press. Here is the latest--Governor Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota:

CHICAGO – Minnesota GOP Gov. Tim Pawlenty took an aggressive line against President Barack Obama’s proposed health care overhaul Friday and insisted that a rejection of the Democratic plan could usher in a Republican resurgence.

“It appears that President Obama is making great progress on climate change, he is changing the political climate in the country back to Republican,” Pawlenty said during a speech to the second annual GOPAC conference in Chicago.

“He went around the country last fall promising ‘change we can believe in,’ but now we see it’s about changing what we believe in,” said Pawlenty, an anticipated 2012 Republican presidential contender. “We need to be calling out the flaws and misguided decisions of the Democrats in Congress and the Obama administration.”

Pawlenty characterized Obama as an “extreme left liberal” proposing a health care plan “that we don’t recognize as supporters of the free market.”

(Yawn)

I'm not from Missouri, but these Republicans have got to do more than talk to get my attention and keep it. They need to show me something.

Nazis, Nazis, and more Nazis

2009-08-14T12:21:00.000-07:00

Andy McCarthy, over at National Review, has written an excellent piece on the whole Nazi brouhaha started (this time) by Nancy Pelosi. I will include here a teaser and then invite you over there to read the entire article.

Andy McCarthy: It’s this week’s fashion on the left, and among such fashionably contemplative moderates as Mort Kondracke, to blast Rush Limbaugh for comparing Democrats to the Nazis. It’s no surprise that the Obama hardcores are misrepresenting the sequence and substance of events, but I would have hoped that Kondracke would at least have noted that Rush’s comparison — even if Kondracke thought it unwise — was neither gratuitous nor demagogic.

To recap, the speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, started this episode by comparing American citizens who oppose Obamacare to the Nazis and asserting that her political opponents were donning “swastikas.” (Sen. Barbara Boxer simultaneously ripped Obamacare dissenters for their Brooks Brothers suits — it’s not altogether clear where on the twill the swastika goes.) Pelosi’s tactic was the shopworn smear we on the right have dealt with for six decades. There is no conceivable substantive connection between opposition to Obamacare and German National Socialism — they are antithetical. By invoking the Nazis, Pelosi was patently slandering dissenters as racist thugs.

Read the entire article by clicking here.

This also exposes the hypocrisy of the left as they ramp up the rhetoric while simultaneously claiming that it is the right which is ramping up the rhetoric and that this is dangerous.

ShamNow

2009-08-13T20:32:00.001-07:00

Found this over at the B.S.Report.

Paglia Agrees With The River

2009-08-13T19:50:00.000-07:00

Camille Paglia, columnist, uber-liberal, and Obama aficionado, agrees with me and this blog concerning Nancy Pelosi . . . and . . . the town-hall protesters.

She writes in Salon:

But who would have thought that the sober, deliberative Barack Obama would have nothing to propose but vague and slippery promises--or that he would so easily cede the leadership clout of the executive branch to a chaotic, rapacious, solipsistic Congress? House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, whom I used to admire for her smooth aplomb under pressure, has clearly gone off the deep end with her bizarre rants about legitimate town-hall protests by American citizens. She is doing grievous damage to the party and should immediately step down.

There is plenty of blame to go around. Obama's aggressive endorsement of a health care plan that does not even exist yet, except in five competing, fluctuating drafts, makes Washington seem like Cloud Cuckoo Land. The president is promoting the most colossal, brazen bait-and-switch operation since the Bush administration snookered the country into invading Iraq with apocalyptic visions of mushroom clouds over American cities. . . .

In fact, Paglia speaks a lot of truth in her column and I recommend you go there and read all of it. The admissions will be shocking coming from a liberal, but that's Paglia.

Wow. A Lefty who is honest about the Left. Somebody pinch me.

Click here for entire column.

Death Panels?

2009-08-13T18:44:00.000-07:00

From the Politico: (click here for the entire article)

Former Alaska GOP Gov. Sarah Palin defended her claim that the Democratic health care proposal would create “death panels” in a statement Wednesday night slamming President Barack Obama.

“Yesterday President Obama responded to my statement that Democratic health care proposals would lead to rationed care; that the sick, the elderly and the disabled would suffer the most under such rationing; and that under such a system, these ‘unproductive’ members of society could face the prospect of government bureaucrats determining whether they deserve health care,” Palin wrote in a note on her Facebook page.

“The provision that President Obama refers to is Section 1233 of HR 3200, entitled ‘Advance Care Planning Consultation.’ With all due respect, it’s misleading for the president to describe this section as an entirely voluntary provision that simply increases the information offered to Medicare recipients,” she continued.

“Section 1233 authorizes advanced care planning consultations for senior citizens on Medicare every five years, and more often ‘if there is a significant change in the health condition of the individual ... or upon admission to a skilled nursing facility, a long-term care facility... or a hospice program.’"

The White House and Democratic lawmakers have blasted Palin in recent days for suggesting that her own son, Trig, would have had to face a bureaucratic panel to get access to health care under the provision in the House health care proposal because he was born with Down syndrome.

“The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama’s ‘death panel’ so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their ‘level of productivity in society,’ whether they are worthy of health care. Such a system is downright evil,” Palin wrote last week.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs identified Palin on Wednesday as one of the GOP leaders he says is spreading “wrong” information about the health care debate.

Palin has come under a lot of fire for her rhetoric, posted last week on her facebook page, concerning ObamaCare. This fire has come both from the Left and some on the Right for whom Sarah continues to be an embarrassment. On the Right, the criticism has been that this sort of hyperbole, referring to the end-of-life counseling sessions mandated under the House health care reform bill as "death panels", is a type of hyperbole that is unproductive and makes conservatives look shrill.

Now watch this video clip that ABCNews.com ran on its webpage as "Obama Debunks Health Bill's 'Death Panel' Rule".

So who are you going to believe, Palin or Obama?

Well, . . . then there's this neat little piece from a week or so ago in Oregon where they have state-run health care. You know, the good old government option.

From an article at ABCNews.com . . .

The news from Barbara Wagner's doctor was bad, but the rejection letter from her insurance company was crushing.

The 64-year-old Oregon woman, whose lung cancer had been in remission, learned the disease had returned and would likely kill her. Her last hope was a $4,000-a-month drug that her doctor prescribed for her, but the insurance company refused to pay.

What the Oregon Health Plan did agree to cover, however, were drugs for a physician-assisted death. Those drugs would cost about $50.

"It was horrible," Wagner told ABCNews.com. "I got a letter in the mail that basically said if you want to take the pills, we will help you get that from the doctor and we will stand there and watch you die. But we won't give you the medication to live."

Notice how ABC spins this horrible act as something done by an "insurance company." Sort of implies that this is some private, evil, corporation. Not so fast. A closer look reveals what ABC simply will not state explicitly, that this is a government insurance company--the Oregon Health Plan. This is ObamaCare at the state level.

So, are we going to believe Obama . . . or observation?

I think Palin is right.

Miller Time

2009-08-13T18:18:00.000-07:00

I don't usually watch the O'Reilly Factor because, frankly, Bill annoys me. However, I used to record it just to skim through and see if Dennis Miller was going to be on. Then, I discovered youtube and found out I could just catch the "Miller Time" segments the next day there, without even needing a satellite or cable. This one I include here because Dennis is in particularly good form and tears into Nancy Pelosi with vigor. Enjoy.

Be honest, don't you think O'Reilly gets in the way?

John Dingell Plays the Race Card

2009-08-11T11:31:00.000-07:00

Yes, American subjects, this is what the American nobility thinks of you.

They're not listening.

Hillary Slams Pelosi

2009-08-11T11:04:00.000-07:00

As you may have heard, several big-name Democrats have verbalized, recently, the opinion that those American citizens who show up at Town Hall Meetings to question their legislators or vocalize their dissent about the current helath care proposal being considered by Congress are un-American. The most recent example of this was Nancy Pelosi over the weekend.

From FoxNews.com

"House Speaker Nancy Pelosi turned the health care debate up a notch Monday, penning a column along with her top deputy that questioned the patriotism of those disrupting town hall meetings to air their complaints.

Pelosi and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer claimed such behavior is 'simply un-American.'"

Again, to read the entire newspiece click here.

Interesting.

Even more interesting was Hillary Clinton's purported response to that accusation.

(smile)

The B.S. Report

2009-08-11T05:42:00.000-07:00

I just found this blog yesterday and thought it worth linking here. These guys are prolific, so good luck keeping up with them. What I read there was both humorous and poignant.

The B.S. Report

Congress, the Economy, and the Constitution

2009-08-10T06:45:00.000-07:00

Walter E. Williams, syndicated columnist and economics professor at George Mason University has a great piece on what Congress can and cannot do constitutionally regarding the economy. First let me give a pertinent quotation, then I'll link the whole editorial. It is worth the read.

"The Constitution provides, through Article V, a means by which the Constitution can be altered. My question to my fellow Americans whether they are liberal or conservative: Has the Constitution been amended to permit Congress to manage the economy? I'd also ask that question to members of the U.S. Supreme Court. I personally know of no such amendment. What we're witnessing today is nothing less than a massive escalation in White House and congressional thuggery. Secure in the knowledge that the American people are compliant and willing to cast off the limitations imposed on Washington by the nation's founders, future administrations are probably going to be even more emboldened than Obama and the current Congress."

Now go read the whole article. Click here.

Pelosi and Swastikas

2009-08-06T20:02:00.000-07:00

Here is our esteemed House Speaker, the Honorable Nancy Pelosi, telling us what she thinks of average citizens expressing their views. She pulls out the time-honored canard of "Nazi Republicans." Heart-warming isn't it?

Is there anyone who actually believes this? The arrogance of this woman to think we are all so stupid as to not check her facts, but just to believe her no matter how outrageous her claims should be. It is pure hubris.

AARP Town Meeting Erupts

2009-08-06T19:26:00.000-07:00

Check out this video. It speaks for itself. Comments are welcome.

Health Care Misinformation

2009-08-06T11:12:00.000-07:00

The White House is concerned about misinformation being spread by bad people concerning the health care reform being touted by Generalissimo Obama. So concerned are they that they have generated an email account so that the populace can report the spread of misinformation to Mr. Obama himself.

Click on this sentence to get it straight from the horse's mouth.

Don't want to go there? Here's one of the pertinent quotations:

"There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care. These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov."

For the record, that "misinformation is coming from people who actually have read the bill that is being considered by the House of Representatives right now. It is the House bill which would specifically enable the government to go straight into an individual's bank account to collect funds for services rendered. It is the House bill which recommends regular end-of-life counseling between a patient and the government doctor, a practice which could easily, easily be abused as recent news items have established.

(I plan to blog something about that this evening.)

Also, in that post on the White House blog, the White House again repreats the lie that . . .

"For the record, the President has consistently said that if you like your insurance plan, your doctor, or both, you will be able to keep them."

That is a lie and anyone with any sense knows it. While it is true that there is nothing directly in the bill to take anyone's private insurance away from them, it is also true that as soon as employers have the ability to reduce their insurance costs by dumping their employees onto the government option, many of them will do so. Nothing in the bill protects consumers from this, therefore the statement is a lie, intended to deceive.

But, that's beside the point of this post.

Just think about what the White House has done here, especially in the light of my last two posts. Are we really to spy on our neighbors, turn in our friends, point the finger at people who have differing political opinions from the current administration? Are we to turn them in to the government?

Perhaps someone might object that this is not the intent, rather that the intent is for the White House to gather arguments and misinformation opposing the plan so that they may effectively defeat those arguments and misinformation?

Do you really believe that given these guys' record?

And, if so, why would they do it this way? Don't they know they are pouring blood into the water?

The Tea Parties

2009-08-06T06:04:00.000-07:00

All over the country there is a simmering anger at what is going on in Washington. I've been alive for forty years, and in my short lifetime I have never seen average working Americans this stirred up and angry. I see it first-hand every day here in east Texas and I hear it in the media, both main-stream (Left) and alternative (Right). The tea parties are a prime example. While there have been some Republican leaders who have tried to make hay by appearing at these tea parties (our esteemed Texas Governor Rick Perry would be an example) I know first-hand that these events are not organized by the Republican Party. In fact, many if not most of the people attending these are as angry at the Republicans as they are at the Democrats. At the heart of the matter is a feeling of disenfranchisement and a growing fear of our liberties being taken away.

After one of the local tea party events got a huge attendance I was talking to my boss about the event the following day. My boss is a liberal and he began spewing the leftist talking points about the rally. He said, "I don't understand what these people are angry about, Bush is the one who drove up these deficits in the first place."

That was true as far as it went. But I informed him that these people were as angry at Bush as they were at Obama. Bush started it, Obama has escalated it. It is a mistake to think that these tea parties are a Republican-driven vehicle. In fact, if you go to the Texas tea party web-site you will find that the only political party they are promoting is something called the Constitutional Party. If this is a Republican opposition effort, then they are not doing a good job of promoting themselves. (But when was the last time a Republican really did a good job of anything politically anyway?)

The next claim my boss tried to make was that these were a bunch of racists. That's typical leftist. When in doubt, pull out the race card. When I asked him for evidence of this, he pointed out that someone had brought in a placard claiming Obama was a Muslim.

Yep, that's it. Talk about a leap in logic. I told him that all this placard proved was that the guy was a nut-job and that events like that always attracted a few nut-jobs. You can't judge a crowd by one or two members. I also pointed out his non sequitur. This caused him to mumble back something about he knows people from the South (he's originally from up north) and he just knew that it was racially motivated.

Again, this is what the Left does. Stand against them and they demonize you. It's not possible that average, working, freedom-loving citizens would get upset about encroaching socialism and attempt to do something--within the parameters of the law--about it. No, there must be some high-level Republican operatives behind it. It is to laugh.

"Enough of the Mob"

2009-08-05T17:57:00.000-07:00

Check out this ad put out by the DNC today.

Nice, isn't it?

Here are American citizens exercising their first amendment rights . . .

1st Amendment: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

. . . in a peaceful manner, no doubt under the assumption that this is a government of the people, for the people, and by the people, and the Democrat National Committee chooses to malign them by portraying them as an angry "mob." These, according to the DNC, are "extremists" who, judging by the photos, are full of hatred and malice. Obviously they are not grass-roots and genuine, rather they are being organized by those ee-vil Republicans who have no ideas at all.

This is classic leftist demagoguery--demonize the opposition.

The favorite debate technique of the Left in this country is the one known as ad hominem. In fact, it is the only one they know, but they use it recklessly and with impunity. Sadly, their constituency has proven itself consistently dull enough to make its use of inestimable value.

Pelosi and Carpet Bombing Washington

2009-07-30T22:52:00.000-07:00

Nancy Pelosi, as quoted on ABCNews's The Note:

“I think it’s very clear that we want a strong public option in the legislation. Insurance companies are out there in full force carpet bombing, shock and awe, against a public option,” Pelosi said.

It would be easy just to laugh at this fool were she not the third most powerful politician in Washington. But, sadly, she is, and that's not a good reflection on us at all. I could tell you what I really think of this woman, but my mother may read this and she would not be proud of me for my honest criticism, I can tell you. So I will leave it at that.

As for her stupid ad hominem attempt at deflection and classic leftist creation of a big corporation bogeyman (how original . . . rolls eyes), let me just say that . . . would that it were so, Nancy, babe. Would that it were so.

[Disclaimer for anyone at the Department of Homeland Security who may be reading this: The River does not promote violence of any kind against anyone. Far from inciting violence, we wholeheartedly preach civil disobedience in manners of conscience. God bless you and have a nice day.]

Rick Perry: Repentance or Expedience?

2009-07-30T22:10:00.000-07:00

I made note of Texas Governor Rick Perry's verbal assault on Obama Care in my last post. In that post I wholeheartedly applauded him and endorsed him for re-election in the governor's race of 2010 in which he will face Texas Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison in the primary. I made my endorsement based on Governor Perry's recent swagger and bravado concerning the 10th amendment and states' rights. I firmly believe in de-centralized power, as did the founders, and the 10th amendment is integral to this. While the federal government has been steadily encroaching on the rights of the states since Lincoln obliterated them, the administration of Generalissimo Obama has been acting as if they never existed.

So naturally my ears perked up when I heard my governor broaching the subject.

To be honest with you, however (and here is my caveat), I have never really paid that much attention to Governor Perry prior to now. He was simply the successor to GWB and got my vote because he was certainly going to be better than anything the Dems managed to throw up against him. So, heretofore, he has received my vote, pretty much, by default.

Which brings me to the topic of this post. A very astute pundit I have recently made the acquaintance of, Allen Lewis, who posts at The Texas Conservative, wrote an interesting piece about Rick Perry here.

And it begs the question. Has Governor Perry had a come-to-Jesus experience concerning the Constitution and individual liberty? Or is he merely trying to grab the conservative base of the Texas Republican party before KBH can--by latching onto the grass-roots tea party movement? Is this new-found conviction or is it pre-election posturing?

What do you think? I'm hoping it's the former and fearful its the latter. Should I write him directly and ask him?

Rick Perry to Defy Obama Administration

2009-07-24T13:39:00.000-07:00

Check out this article in the Fort Worth Star Telegram.

"I think you’ll hear states and governors standing up and saying 'no’ to this type of encroachment on the states with their healthcare," Perry said. "So my hope is that we never have to have that stand-up. But I’m certainly willing and ready for the fight if this administration continues to try to force their very expansive government philosophy down our collective throats." - Rick Perry

Rick Perry is the man and, consequently, has earned The River's early endorsement in the 2010 Texas Governor's race. More on this later.

Texas Conservative

2009-07-23T20:11:00.000-07:00

I'm adding a new blog to my Blog List in the sidebar. It's called the Texas Conservative. I just discovered it and wanted to share. After reading four or five posts I feel an instant kinship with this guy and his thinking. By way of example of what I am talking about check out this blog post from a week or so ago: Laffer Curve

Dick Morris, Barack Obama, and George Orwell

2009-07-23T19:18:00.000-07:00

Dick Morris nails Obama once again, this time in the New York Post.

From an op-ed piece published today in the New York Post:

"President Obama's rhetoric last night summoned the memory of 1984, George Orwell's novel of a nightmarish future--where the slogan of the rulers is 'War is peace; freedom is slavery; ignorance is strength.'

The president assures us that he will cut health-care spending. . .by adding $1 trillion to health-care spending.

He says that 'health-care decisions will not be made by government'. . .while he sets up a new Federal Health Board to tell doctors what treatments they can offer and to whom and under what circumstances.

Obama told the media, 'I will free doctors to make good health-care decisions'. . .by telling the physicians what to do. . . ." - Dick Morris

Free Our Health Care Now Petition

2009-07-22T22:26:00.000-07:00

If you haven't been here to sign your name, be sure to do so. Maybe we can stop this debacle before it happens.

Free Our Health Care Now Petition.

The Crisis in Health Care

2009-07-22T20:55:00.000-07:00

Let me tell you how the conservatives have lost the debate on health care and most of them don't even know it.

I listen to talk radio every day. Talk radio is dominated by the right in this country because the audience for talk radio is naturally on the right--traditional working people who keep up with the world. Lefties have other media that they use to get out their opinions, chiefly traditional news sources and government sponsored media such as National Public Radio.

As an aside, the content of NPR is so dreadfully inane and boring that it would never survive if it had to depend on things like listeners and sponsors--you know, actually make it in the real world.

Dennis Miller says that lefties do not do well getting a radio audience because no one wants to tune in and listen to how bad they are and how they are to blame for all of the world's problems. I'm not sure how accurate Miller's assessment is, but I find it amusing.

As I was saying, I listen to talk radio and by far the dominant theme this week has been Obama-Care. I listen to the conservative pundits denounce and expose the evils of socialized medicine and I listen to leftist callers as they argue the Democrat talking points on the matter. I know both sides of the issue and am adamantly opposed to socialized medicine both on principle and for pragmatic reasons.

But the conservatives have lost this debate and the Republicans, typically, are back on their heels trying to stop the Obama/Pelosi juggernaut and offering their own alternative plans to fix the health care crisis.

And that is exactly where conservatives have lost this debate. They have conceded the premise of the opposition, a premise which is false.

There is no health care crisis in America.

I'm sorry, but there just isn't, and anybody with any sense of reality should know that. Are there problems with our health care system? Certainly. Are people dying in the streets? Certainly not. But you wouldn't know that by listening to the left.

We have the best, most effective, most innovative health care system in the world. We have the best hospitals, doctors, nurses, and research facilities. We are the healthiest people who have ever lived in the history of mankind.

And we have a health care crisis?

The typical leftist response to my assertions would be to point out the problems we have. But I don't deny there are problems. I only deny that a crisis exists. But to listen to Washington and the main-stream media you would think the whole thing is about to collapse and we had better act now, right now, before it is eternally too late to save it.

Horse manure.

But conservatives have lost the debate on health care reform because they have conceded the premise beneath which it lies. And, thus, we are poised to destroy the best health care system in the world.

Steyn on Cap and Trade

2009-07-21T22:22:00.000-07:00

"If George III had put the tea clause 247 pages into a 300-page amendment to a 1,000-page bill, he might still have the colonies. Wherever he is now, he must be laughing his head off. Republican government is impossible in an age where not only are the bills too long for a reasonably engaged citizen to read, not only are they too long for a legislator to read, but they’re too long to write down before they’re passed into law. We just have to trust our rulers, and they just have to trust whichever aides negotiated whichever boondoggles with whichever lobbyists. . . ." - from Mark Steyn's 'Jacksonian America'

It's true. Congress passed Cap and Trade before stenographers had even completed typing it. Welcome, again, to the era of more open and honest government. This Congress and this administration are a disgrace. My question is, how long do we put up with this corrupt, bloated, narcissistic band of criminals that populate Washington and feign to represent us?

Global Warming Petition Project

2009-07-21T21:16:00.000-07:00

Pop Quiz Time!

Who said the following?

"There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane or other greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate."

Was it (a) Rush Limbaugh, (b) Bill O'Reilly, (c) Glenn Beck, (d) Sean Hannity, or (e) some wacko creationist?

Click here for the answer.

Remember When Liberals Dreamed?

2009-07-16T21:44:00.000-07:00

Remember when liberals dreamed and talked of achievement? Remember when they were optimistic about the future? Remember when Democrats sent us on a quest for the moon? Remember when they dreamed and achieved like this?

Krauthammer Slams Obama on Nukes

2009-07-16T21:31:00.000-07:00

Some of the "nicer" pundits are becoming more blunt in their criticisms of Generalissimo Obama.

Krauthammer:

"Obama says that his START will be a great boon, setting an example to enable us to better pressure North Korea and Iran to give up their nuclear programs. That a man of Obama's intelligence can believe such nonsense is beyond comprehension. There is not a shred of evidence that cuts by the great powers -- the INF treaty, START I, the Treaty of Moscow (2002) -- induced the curtailment of anyone's programs. Moammar Gaddafi gave up his nukes the week we pulled Saddam Hussein out of his spider hole. No treaty involved. The very notion that Kim Jong Il or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will suddenly abjure nukes because of yet another U.S.-Russian treaty is comical."

To read the entire column click here.

A Solution -- Healthcare Reform

2009-07-16T20:59:00.000-07:00

I have a solution for the "healthcare crisis." It struck me, earlier today, as a relatively simple solution to a complex problem. I know that this crisis is on everyone's mind right now, what with 48 gazillion uninsured serfs dying daily in the streets of America for lack of good coverage. Never fear, dear proletariat, your dear friend and comrade Tom has the solution.

Ready?

Let's put a revolver--check that--a good, solid semi-auto (perhaps a Glock .40 caliber S&W) to the head of every evil rich guy we can find. Let's tell him (them) that if he makes over one million a year that he has to give at least an additional 5.4% of his income to us so we can give it to the underprivileged so that they can have government insurance. In fact, let's tell him that if he doesn't give up this additional income we are going to throw his sorry, rich ass in the slammer with Big Bubba for a cellmate.

Hear that, rich guys? You're gonna give us your money or we're going to throw your butts in jail.

Then, when we have their money, let's create a whole new government bureaucracy (something like the post office, for example) and put it in charge of everyone's health care and then let's put those evil private insurance companies out of business. Then, we'll tell those greedy doctors what they can and cannot charge and if they try to go around our system we'll throw their butts in jail too.

Then, after all the evil corporations and sinister small businesses drop health insurance coverage for their employees in favor of putting them on the government plan, we'll make it illegal for any of them to seek out their own private plan.

What an idea!

This way everyone has the same great coverage and everything is fair. It works so well with the VA and on the Indian Reservations . . .

Wait a minute, I just noticed something.

Dang it! My plan is the same as Obama's!

Dick Morris: Obama is a one-term President

2009-07-16T20:46:00.000-07:00

You know Dick Morris, right? He was the brains behind Bill Clinton. Got him elected several times as governor of Arkansas and then twice as President. Dick Morris is a pure political animal. He eats, sleeps, breathes, and speaks politics. He may not always be right, but he is always worth listening to. Here's what he is saying about Obama's Presidency:

Finally, Obama has laid a trap for himself. Just as the economy is coming out of its recession -- in 2010 and 2011 -- and he begins to run for reelection, he is going to face massive inflation. The money supply has more than tripled since October of 2008 and is going up each week as the Fed buys Treasury bills and other securities to "monetize the debt" (i.e., give other people money so they can lend it back to the government and charge it interest for doing so). With each new infusion of cash, the problem of avoiding inflation becomes particularly severe. Obama could well lose the elections of 2012 because of the inflation his deficit has created.

Of course, we all know that the only way to put the inflation virus back in the test tube is to trigger a new recession, this time caused by massive increases in interest rates, as Fed Chairman Paul Volcker did in 1979. If the recession doesn't doom Obama to a single term, the inflation will. And if the inflation doesn't get him, the subsequent recession will.

The deeper he gets into his term, the more it is apparent that he threw it all away when he first took office and demanded over $1 trillion in stimulus and supplemental appropriation spending. He was doomed to lose the game right after he received the first kickoff.

To read the whole article click here.

No Longer a Republican

2009-07-14T21:45:00.000-07:00

Dennis Miller is one cool cat, to use an expression he might use. Miller has an exceptional vocabulary, an encyclopedic memory, a razor wit, and a unequalled command of the art of the metaphor. I love Dennis, absolutely love him.

Today he had Mike Murphy of NBC news and Time magazine as a guest on his radio show. Murphy is one of those northeastern Republican political pundits . . . let's not go there . . . and the topic of discussion was Sarah Palin, her resignation, her impact on the McCain ticket, and her possible political future. Murphy is no Palin fan. Too bad for him.

There were several things I disagreed with Murphy on, but I think the thing that grated on me the most was the apparent lack of understanding he displayed of what is going on with the Republican "base." Rank and file conservatives are fed up with how they have been treated lately by the Republican party and Murphy doesn't get that.

According to Murphy, Palin was a drag on the McCain ticket because she didn't add anything. Admitting that she was a charismatic and engaging figure, Murphy could not see how that was anything McCain really needed. I won't quote him from memory, but the gist of his point was that McCain needed someone who would bring in swing voters and Palin could not do that. All she could do was energize a base that was going to show up for McCain anyway.

Wrong.

Murphy said to Miller something akin to Come on, Dennis, those guys were going to the polls for McCain anyway. Do you think they would vote for Obama?

Wrong again. I wanted to talk to this guy so badly, and they did take some callers but I was not in an area for a good signal, so I didn't try.

Mike Murphy could not be more wrong. I was not going to vote for John McCain. I did not like him. I viewed him as a compromiser. I viewed him as a man who epitomized the problem with the Republican party and I absolutely, positively was not going to vote for John McCain.

And, no, Mike Murphy, I was not going to vote for Generalissimo Obama either.

I had made up my mind to go to the polls, vote in every other race, then for President vote for Ronald Reagan as a write-in candidate. My first Presidential election was 1988 and I never had a chance to pull the lever for the Gipper and I thought that this way I could at least tell my grandchildren that I had.

But John McCain was not getting my vote. Period.

Then McCain picked Sarah Palin as his veep and I decided I would vote for them . . . her. So I did.

So, yes, Mike Murphy, Sarah Palin did add something to McCain's ticket. She added me and along with me a whole lot of other frustrated, disgusted conservatives who had also planned on sitting out. If not for Palin it would have been far uglier than it was.

As for me, after seeing how the McCain campaign treated Palin, and after noting that not one Republican political figure would stand up for her, I dropped out of the ranks of the Republicans. I now consider myself a constitutionalist--a libertarian independent. And I will never vote for a moderate Republican again--for anything.

Palin Quits! Good Riddance!

2009-07-10T20:23:00.000-07:00

So many Leftists have peed themselves with joy over Sarah Palin's erstwhile departure from politics and the public scene that even a casual stroll on some of the pathways of American political punditry has become quite hazardous (and smelly!).

Nevertheless, I have taken a stroll down some of those paths and I have noticed some common themes.

Like the little lemmings that they are, the Leftists are all repeating similar things. The themes run along this vein - She's a quitter. She's a loser. She was always a lousy candidate. You see how she would have quit on America? What is she saying to our troops? She can't take a little heat? There must be a scandal about to hit that we don't know about yet. She better not ever run again now! . . . etc., etc., ad nauseum.

Yawn.

Their obsession over her is borderline neurotic. If what they say is true, why must they try so hard to convince everyone?

Hmm?

You go, Sarah! And if you disappeared from American life and culture and politics completely, you have already done enough to earn your way onto The River's collage. So, up you go, right beneath the Pistol.

I am certain we will hear more from you, though.

New Taxes! Cap and Trade

2009-07-02T16:51:00.000-07:00

My friend, James, over at the Manic Eclectic has written a timely piece on the farce of corporate taxes. You can go there and check out what he says on the topic. I'll sum it up for you (though James was much nicer than I am): Corporations don't pay taxes, you idiots, they just raise the prices of goods and services and the consumers are the ones who, in reality, pay the new taxes.

Understand that if the Senate passes the House bill and hands it over to Generalissimo Obama, cap and trade becomes law. It is the largest tax bill in American history and all of us will be paying those taxes. We will be paying them in our utility bills. We will be paying them at the pump. We will be paying for them at the grocery store. We will be paying for them in the price of all goods because it takes energy to produce and transport goods.

Remember when this was a free country? Our liberty is being raped and we are expected just to say "thank-you" for the attention.

Tyranny thy name is Obama.

Truth, Lies, and Democrats

2009-07-01T21:01:00.000-07:00

It was my Christian upbringing that gave me my love for truth. Ironically, it was that love for truth that caused me to cast off many of the traditional Christian beliefs I was taught as a child. I am still a Christian, just not the same kind. And I still have a great love for the truth, whatever that truth happens to be.

If you are of Jewish or Christian faith, you may be familiar with a Proverb that often pops into my head and which I have adopted as a maxim for life. Here it is:

Proverbs 23:23 (ESV)
Buy truth, and do not sell it;

I've always pictured an object labeled "truth" sitting on a shelf and I'm looking at it and wondering if it is worth buying or not. Is it? Apparently so. But what if it costs a lot? Doesn't matter, I still should buy it. What if it costs me everything? Doesn't matter, I still should buy it. "Buy truth."

Okay, but now that I have it what if someone offers me money for it? Should I take the money?

No.

What if they offer me a lot of money, more money than I've ever seen? What if by selling it I can achieve everything I've ever dreamed of?

"Buy truth, and do not sell it;"

Pretty simple, isn't it? And plenty wise, too.

But people don't love truth anymore, if they ever did. People don't want the truth. People don't believe the truth. People go out of their way to avoid the truth.

And politicians seemingly can gain anything they want by lying to a populace who loves to be lied to.

Which brings us, of course, to the Democrat party. Democrats lie all the time and their constituents not only expect, but they seem to love, to be lied to. Remember how the press used to admire Bubba Bill Clinton so much for his great gift of lying? He would look at them, smile, lie through his teeth, and they would fawn over him for it, admiring his abilities. Meanwhile, inner-city-public-school-indoctrinated-idiot democrat voters would swallow those lies whole and then spew them out ad nauseum as if they were gospel and end-all arguments.

This isn't an anomaly. This is how Democrats roll in their hood.

Most people tell lies every once in a while. It's a part of our fallenness. It jumps out at us as a cheap avenue of escape. We know it's bad, but we hope it will save us something--maybe embarrassment, or culpability of some kind.

But Democrats lie with impunity. They lie because they know they can. They lie because their constituents are stupid. They lie because they simply cannot tell us the truth. If they did, nobody would vote for them. Their agenda is that un-American.

All of this brings us to Barack Hussein Obama, liar-in-chief. Remember how he was going to have more open and honest government?

Yes, 69 million fools believed that load of horse manure. In these past six months have we seen enough to know better yet? Sadly, I doubt it. You can fool some of the people all of the time.

Obama has presided over a Congress recklessly ramrodding voluminous tomes of horrid, corpulent legislation in the dark of night, without anyone even reading it first. Half the members of Congress voting on any given piece of legislation in the last six months haven't even known what the hell they were voting on.

Obama is a lying . . . (you fill in the blank).

But you already, knew that. He's a Democrat. It's how they roll.

Need more? How about his no-new-taxes pledge. Remember that? Remember how no one earning less than $250,000 a year was going to see a tax increase? Then along came that huge hike in tobacco taxes, as if no one earning less than $250,000 a year ever buys tobacco.

For any idiot Democrat who happens to blindly blunder by here, yes (I'm typing s-l-o-w-l-y so you'll be able to keep up) that's a tax increase for people making less than $250,000 a year.

Anybody making less than $250,000 a year buy gasoline, or diesel, or heating oil, or electricity? You just got punked by Obama, too. Unless the U.S. Senate rises up and saves us, somehow, you're about to get bodyslammed by the biggest tax hike in U.S. history. It's called cap and trade. More on that later.

Obama. Liar.

Liar. Obama.

It's the truth. Buy it.

Is Allan Keyes a Whack Job?

2009-06-27T20:09:00.000-07:00

I admit I do not know much about the man. He seems to come around once every four years running for President in the Republican primaries. A few cycles back I think he got up some steam and made a showing in a few states. Just as he was beginning to look viable there was the incident where he got arrested in some act of civil disobedience. I never knew too much about that one. Then he ran off to Illinois to run against Obama for U.S. Senate. That didn't work well. He lost by a hefty margin and seems to have been heading downhill ever since. Then, today, I run across this gem of a rant. I'm not sure how old it is, or how much substance he has, but you gotta love it.

Is it just me or is more and more of this sentiment being expressed outside of the usual confines of nuttiness?

Mark Steyn Echoes My Sentiment

2009-06-27T19:01:00.000-07:00

Only he does so with much more wit, charm, and eloquence.

Yesterday I posted this (click here) about the missing governor of South Carolina and comments I heard repeatedly about the audacity of executive absence. Today I read this column linked at Steyn Online from Mark Steyn. Apparently it was posted yesterday but somehow I missed it until today.

I'm glad to know I wasn't the only one thinking along those lines.

Dick Morris - Catastrophe

2009-06-26T20:42:00.000-07:00

Dick Morris, along with his wife, has just published a new book entitled Catastrophe. Here's what it looks like.

I like Dick Morris. I don't always see eye to eye with him and I certainly did not like him while he was serving as the brains behind the Bill Clinton political machine, but I do like him now and I most certainly respect his political opinions.

Having said that, lately he has been scaring me to death. What scares me is that I think he may be right about this guy Obama and about what may be happening to our country over the next few years. Check out this little video about his book.

Cap and Trade 2009

2009-06-26T19:50:00.000-07:00

Well, it happened. I heard it on the radio about 5:40pm CDT. Another large piece of our liberty was sold down the river and probably for less than thirty pieces of silver.

While most of America was obsessing over the death of a psychologically disturbed pop star, the U.S. House of Representatives rushed through, and got passed by a narrow margin, an energy tax bill that will cost thousands of jobs and hundreds of thousands of dollars.

But don't feel too bad. Government just got bigger . . . and more intrusive . . . and richer . . . and . . . isn't that the goal of this Congress and administration anyway?

Government wins, the individual gets screwed. Welcome to 21st century America.

These people have no shame.

What's worse--the bill passed by seven votes, eight of which were Republicans. When I find out their names I will post them here. It is bad enough when Democrats sponsor and pass tripe like this--they were born stupid. But when Republicans are involved it makes my stomach wretch. You can't belong to the party of Reagan and do this. It's like a Jew selling gold swastikas on a chain . . . the ultimate betrayal. I hope this traitorous octuplet suffer a very painful, agonizing, miserable, horrible (political) death.

Only my better nature caused me to return to that previous sentence and add the word "political." But, honestly, in my heart I left it out.

Another victory for tyranny.

Missing Governors

2009-06-26T18:44:00.000-07:00

Much was made of the absence of South Carolina governor Mark Sanford over Father's Day weekend. While the Democrats and media tried to make political hay of it and the governor's mansion, including Sanford's wife, sought in turn to make nothing out of it, Sanford himself, ultimately, is the one who made it what it was--a wreck.

Just what we needed, another political sex scandal. Sadly, this time it was what looked to be a good guy involved in it instead of the usual miscreants. Looks can be deceiving, it appears. (chuckle)

One of the more interesting aspects of all this, in my view, was one of the whines that kept squeaking out while the Palmetto-in-chief was out on his alleged Appalachian jaunt. It was repeated several times in my hearing even after the governor had returned from what turned out to be a romp on the beach with a mistress. This whine was uttered by one particularly miffed caller to the Dennis Miller radio show in the following fashion: "How can a governor just leave his state like that without even leaving anyone in charge? What if a natural disaster or something had happened while he was gone?" To the caller's discredit, I don't even think he was a citizen of Sanford's state. At any rate, that particular sentiment had already been expressed enough to irritate me, then this guy came along and provoked me into the following rant . . .

(Here's what I wish I could have said to that guy)

Are you serious? How old are you, twelve? You can't get along in your life without a governor for a couple of days? Where did we get this dependency upon government to the point that we are actually afraid that something bad might happen and we won't have the governor around to save us? Is the governor your daddy? Protector and provider? Arch-nemesis of the boogie-man?

Here's what you do, junior, if a natural disaster happens while the governor isn't around . . . be responsible for yourself. Take care of yourself. Provide for yourself.

Handle it yourself.

Have we really reached the point where we get nervous if the governor of our state steps away for a few days? I bet there are a lot of people out there who ardently wish their governor would go awol. I can remember a time when Ann Richards was messing with Texas that I would have felt great relief to get up in the morning and read a news story saying that she had been missing for several days. An awol governor can't screw things up.

Say, I have an idea. How about someone convincing the unholy trinity of Pelosi, Reid, and Obama to go awol? God knows I would love to tell them to take a hike.

Neda Agha Soltan - Dies For Freedom

2009-06-23T19:54:00.000-07:00

From the Huffington Post . . . (link to full story)

"CAIRO — She lies in the Tehran street with her headscarf half-off, blood pooling around her jeans and white sneakers.

"Don't be afraid, Neda dear, don't be afraid," a white-haired man says desperately in Persian. Another man presses on her chest, trying to keep her alive.

Scarlet blood gushes from her nose and mouth and courses across her pale face. Men and women scream in horror as they realize she is dead or dying."

Neda Agha Soltan, age 27, was murdered just days ago, shot in cold blood on the streets of Tehran as she peacefully demonstrated in opposition to the tyranny and injustice of the Islamo-fascist regime which rules, and has ruled Iran since 1979 . . . when they seized power due to Jimmy Carter's ineptness.

And then there is this quotation from an article in the UK Telegraph: (link to full article)

"I told her, 'Neda, don't go'," said a woman called Golshad. "She said, 'Don't worry. It's just one bullet and it's over'."

It was not the only occasion in which she alluded to the prospect of dying.

Miss Agha Soltan's boyfriend, Caspian Makan, a 37-year-old photojournalist who met her abroad, spoke of his girlfriend's determination to protest in the name of "freedom" as he spoke of his grief.

"Neda had said that even if she lost her life and got a bullet in her heart, she would carry on," said Mr Makan. "Unfortunately, that is how she died, a bullet hit her heart and her lung, and maybe 5 or 6 minutes later, she died."

He added: "She gave a big lesson to everyone even though she was very young.

"She only ever said that she wanted one thing, she wanted democracy and freedom for the people of Iran,"

You don't negotiate with tyrants who murder innocent people in the streets. You don't invite them over for hot dogs and fireworks on the 4th of July. You don't try to appease them. You can't just leave them alone, because at the same time they are murdering their own people they are arming themselves with nuclear weapons and have threatened the annihilation of Israel and death to the United States.

You cannot just ignore them because they will not ignore you. You cannot excuse them for there is no excuse for tyranny and murderous, barbaric behavior. You don't try to understand them or blame the West or walk in their shoes. You don't make ridiculously false moral equivalencies. You just have to deal with and defeat them. They leave you no choice.

Tonight we pray for those who stand in the streets of Tehran for liberty. We pray that their civil disobedience will bring about the change they seek. We pray for liberty to rule the day and for the tyrants to be defeated.

There is no peace until there is liberty. There is no liberty until tyranny has been defeated.

A Nod to Neil Peart and Rush

2009-06-23T19:07:00.000-07:00

The idea for this blog came to me while listening to the classic Rush song Tom Sawyer. The lyrics were, at least in part, penned by Neil Peart, while Geddy Lee's voice wailing "The river!" is simply unforgettable. It is a powerful song with powerful lyrics--too heady for me to really get when I first heard it as an impressionable but slightly dull twelve-year-old. But at forty I think I pretty much get them and it wouldn't be right to have this blog with this theme without acknowledging Lee, Peart, and Lifeson, and their inspiration for it. Tonight I tip a cold one back for you boys and hope all is well for you.

Here is a link to their site.

By the way, all their old albums have been re-mastered and are available on CD. I've been purchasing them one at a time and re-enjoying them. Besides their great music, I appreciate the depth of their lyrics some of which are quite poignant in today's political climate. No Leftists these guys, unless you mean in the classic Jeffersonian sense. At least in their early stuff they come across as quite the Libertarians.

I recommend you buy some of their music if that style is your cup of tea. And if you've never heard them before give them a shot. They are, in my opinion, the pinnacle of rock-n-roll.

The Republic for which it stands (Who is Tom Sawyer?)

2009-06-21T21:02:00.000-07:00

"I pledge allegiance to the flag
And to the Republic for which it stands . . ."

That Republic no longer exists.

It has been replaced by a monolithic government which robs men of wealth, property and liberty. That monolithic federal government so little resembles the Great Republic of Washington, Jefferson, and Adams that these men would not even recognize it. Their Republic has died the death of a thousand cuts--none of them budget cuts to be sure.

Individual liberty is on the run. No longer in fashion, she has fled in search of a defender, a protector, a refuge. She finds it nowhere, not in either major political party, not in any major city, not in any newspaper or major media outlet. Those who still love her are few and those among them brave enough to stand up for her are impugned barbarously. Tyranny is now in vogue and woe be to those who oppose that ravenous beast.

I am one of those.

Am I a right-wing nut job--a conspiracy theorist who believes the world is run by Jewish bankers or the Illuminati or Bilderbergers? No. People who believe in vast conspiracies are idiots, even if they happen to be First Lady or Senator from New York or Secretary of State. No conspiracy theorist here.

Am I a militia member? Nope. Those guys need to get a brain too.

What am I then?

I'm fed up, that's what I am. I'm fed up with career politicians who exist to serve themselves and their own greed and power at the expense of taxpayers. I am fed up with a federal bureaucracy which gets more bloated by the minute, sucking the private sector dry. I am fed up with Washington/New York/East Coast/Hollywood elitists who think they exist to run (read: ruin) our lives. I am fed up with the lies these elitists feed me every day and expect me to believe thinking I must be as stupid as they are.

For what do I stand?

I stand for the individual--his life, his liberty, his property, his pursuit of happiness. I stand for states' rights, once regarded as sacred, now no longer in existence. I stand for de-centralized government. I believe in free speech, free press, freedom of religion, freedom to assemble and redress the government for its abuses, gun rights, freedom from excessive, unjust, and abusive taxation, and freedom from the tyranny being perpetrated on this once great land by a mob of elitist so-called progressives who meet regularly in a swamp area known as Washinton D.C. in order to conspire to take away those liberties which we as a nation once valued above our own lives.

If Thomas Jefferson were alive today he would be leading another rebellion.

I am not here to start or lead or even join a rebellion. What I am here to do is to stir up enough trouble for those Washington D.C. parasites that they will have to deal with an educated populace--armed with truth and angry for liberty. I am not for armed resistance. I am for civil disobedience. The difference between those two is the difference between Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X.

Enough is enough.

Today's Tom Sawyer

2009-06-16T22:12:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the River.

Perhaps you fashion yourself as an independent thinker. That's nice.

Maybe you think of yourself as well-informed on the news of the day. That's nice, too.

Maybe you think you have things figured out. After all, you think. You feel. You're hip. You know who you are and what you are. You're a conservative . . . or a liberal . . . or a moderate . . . or a libertarian . . . or whatever. You're also a Christian, evangelical, maybe Roman Catholic, . . . or not. Maybe you're above religion. You don't need a crutch.

Whoever you are, whatever you are, I'm here to challenge you. My name? Tom Sawyer . . . today's Tom Sawyer. Pleased to meet you.

I hope you'll stick around and be challenged. I want you to think. Yeah, I know. Sure. Whatever. I've heard it before. I know you think that you think . . . it's just that I don't believe you. That's right. I'm calling you out. On this blog I'm really going to make you think . . . about politics, religion, philosophy, you name it. I am here to challenge the status quo, conventional wisdom, and you.

Are you up for it?