Saturday, November 24, 2012

Schweizer: Obama Admin Uses 'Green Energy' Loans to 'Recycle' Money Back to Donors

Schweizer: Obama Admin Uses 'Green Energy' Loans to 'Recycle' Money Back to Donors

Peter Schweizer, president of the Government Accountability Institute, said President Barack Obama had a "recycling" program that used crony capitalism to reward its campaign contributors, who would then funnel money back to the Obama campaign.  

Appearing on Fox News's one-hour special on Thursday about the "District of Corruption" movie, Schweizer said crony capitalism was so rampant in the Obama administration that Obama campaign bundlers received more than $21,000 on average in government-backed loans and grants for every dollar they contributed to the Obama campaign. 

Breitbart: More People on Food Stamps Than Populations of 24 States Combined - Leah Barkoukis

Breitbart: More People on Food Stamps Than Populations of 24 States Combined - Leah Barkoukis

Under President Obama the participation rate in the food stamp program has skyrocketed—one in seven Americans now receives food stamps. To keep up with the demands of the burgeoning program, spending has thus “doubled from roughly $39 billion in 2008 to an estimated $85 billion in 2012,” and nearly quadrupled since 2000. According to Heritage, “Today, the food stamps program is one of the largest and the fastest growing of the roughly 80 welfare programs funded by the federal government.” With that said, brace yourself for Breitbart’s findings: “The number of individuals on food stamps now exceeds the combined populations of 24 states and the District of Columbia.

Gender and race: the shields of the Obama adminstration [Reader Post] | Flopping Aces

Gender and race: the shields of the Obama adminstration [Reader Post] | Flopping Aces

The source of Obama’s lifelong “luck” and power is that guilty white people have gone out of their way to help him and give him whatever he wanted because they feel doing so proves they aren’t racists…and this has enabled him to become the most powerful man in the country despite the fact he seeks America’s ruination

How the left destroyed the culture - Atlas Shrugs

How the left destroyed the culture - Atlas Shrugs

It is one of the foundational myths of contemporary liberalism: the idea that American culture in the 1950s was not only stifling in its banality but a subtle form of fascism that constituted a danger to the Republic. Whatever the excesses of the 1960s might have been, so the argument goes, that decade represented the necessary struggle to free America’s mind-damaged automatons from their captivity at the hands of the Lords of Conformity and Kitsch. And yet, from a remove of more than a half century, we can see that the 1950s were in fact a high point for American culture—a period when many in the vast middle class aspired to elevate their tastes and were given the means and opportunity to do so.

Thursday, November 22, 2012

The Volokh Conspiracy » How Private Property Rights Saved the Pilgrims

The Volokh Conspiracy » How Private Property Rights Saved the Pilgrims

Today is Thanksgiving, and there is much to be thankful for. Not least on the list is the institution of private property, without which the Pilgrims might not have survived, and we would not have this holiday. Economist Benjamin Powell recounts the story here:

Wednesday, November 21, 2012

Thanksgiving Story: The Pilgrims, Socialism, and Free Enterprise

Thanksgiving Story: The Pilgrims, Socialism, and Free Enterprise

The story of the Mayflower, the Pilgrims, and Thanksgiving is widely taught in all our schools.  What is seldom taught, however, is what those Pilgrims learned, at great pain, about Free Enterprise versus Socialism. That story stands as perhaps the clearest and starkest-ever comparison between those two rival systems for human interaction.

small dead animals: "She was likeable enough."

small dead animals: "She was likeable enough."

Her primary accomplishment was "Bill's wife". Her secondary accomplishment was being appointed by a President whose primary accomplishment was "black".

Rand Paul Says States Should Be Free to Legalize Pot

Rand Paul Says States Should Be Free to Legalize Pot:
Sen. Rand
Paul (R-Ky.) addresses drug policy in an
interview
with CNN's Jonathan Karl:
The legalization of marijuana is another issue that Paul points
to as a way for the GOP to reach more young voters.
Paul himself does not favor legalizing marijuana, but he says
individual states—such as Washington and Colorado, which both voted
to legalize in November—should be allowed to make marijuana
legal.
"States should be allowed to make a lot of these decisions,"
Paul says. "I want things to be decided more at a local basis, with
more compassion. I think it would make us as Republicans
different."
He also says legal penalties for marijuana should be
relaxed.
"I think, for example, we should tell young people, 'I'm not in
favor of you smoking pot, but if you get caught smoking pot, I
don't want to put you in jail for 20 years,'" Paul says.
Paul's support for devolving drug policy decisions to the states
is pretty bold in the current political context. It is the policy
embodied in the Ending
Federal Marijuana Prohibition Act of 2011
, which was
co-sponsored by Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) and Paul's father, Rep.
Ron Paul (R-Texas). How many of their fellow congressmen joined
them? Eighteen, all
but one (Dana Rohrabacher of California) a Democrat.
Rand Paul, who was elected to the Senate in 2010, has been
advocating a federalist approach to drug policy for years. In
October 2009, for example, he
told
reporters "most policies of crime and punishment should be
and are addressed at the state level," adding, "I would favor a
more local approach to drugs." The following month The New
York Times
 reported
that "Dr. Paul believes that federal authorities should stay out
of drug enforcement." Both Trey Grayson, Paul's opponent
in the Republican primary, and Jack Conway, his Democratic opponent
in the general election, accused him of being soft on drugs.
Paul faced
similar charges
after he took office, when he
blocked
 bills aimed at banning fake pot, pseudo-speed, and
the synthetc psychedelic 2C-E, arguing that the potential sentences
were too harsh and that "enforcement of most drug laws can and
should be local and state issues" (as his spokeswoman put it). For
a Republican with presidential aspirations (which Rand admits
having in the CNN interview), this is courageous stuff, even if
Rand's hold ultimately succeeded only in
avoiding
a new 20-year mandatory minimum sentence.
Rand's opposition to long prison terms for smoking pot is not so
bold, especially since people do not serve long prison terms for
smoking pot, except in highly unusual situations. Until it was

revised
by an initiative passed two weeks ago, for example,
California's "three strikes" law allowed a life term (with parole
possible after 25 years) for marijuana possession charged as a
felony following two convictions for "serious or violent" crimes.
But that is hardly a typical scenario for the hundreds of thousands
of pot smokers
arrested
every year, who generally do not spend significant
time in jail (although they still suffer the humiliation,
inconvenience, expense, and long-lasting ancillary
penalties
associated with a misdemeanor drug charge).
Furthermore, most Americans (including
Sarah Palin and Bill O'Reilly!) oppose putting pot
smokers in jail for any length of time, and I've never heard even
the hardest of hard-line drug warriors in the U.S. advocate
anything like 20 years for simple marijuana possession.
Such a policy harks back to the marijuana penalties of half a
century ago. In 1966, for instance, Timothy Leary got a 30-year
sentence (ultimately
overturned
 by the Supreme Court) under the old Marihuana
Tax Act for crossing the border from Mexico into the U.S. with a
tiny amount of cannabis. Back then the states also treated
marijuana possession as a felony, meaning pot smokers could be
sentenced
to years in prison for personal-use quantities. That is no longer
the case, and reformers should not pretend it is; there is no
shortage of draconian drug
sentences
to condemn without getting into the Wayback
Machine.
Still, Rand has staked out a clear and consistent position in
favor of less federal involvement in drug law enforcement and less
severe penalties. With his father gone next year, he and
Rohrabacher may be the only Republicans in Congress who are
prepared to criticize the Obama administration for interfering with
marijuana legalization in Colorado and Washington (assuming that is
the course the Justice Department takes). Given Paul's record, I
was rather dismayed to find no criticism of the war on drugs in his

new book
Government Bullies: How Everyday
Americans Are Being Harassed, Abused, and Imprisoned by the
Feds.
Perhaps in a future edition.

Freedom's Lighthouse » Report: Record Number of Americans on Food Stamps this Thanksgiving: 42.2 Million – 11/21/12

Freedom's Lighthouse » Report: Record Number of Americans on Food Stamps this Thanksgiving: 42.2 Million – 11/21/12

As we approach Thanksgiving Day tomorrow, it is startling to realize just how many Americans are now on Food Stamps. This year, it’s a record 42.2 million Americans. Back during the 2012 GOP Nomination Race, Newt Gingrich (above) aptly described Barack Obama as “the Food Stamp President”:

A History of Ineptitude… Susan Rice Thwarted Attempts to Capture Bin Laden – Was Bystander to Rwandan Genocide | The Gateway Pundit

A History of Ineptitude… Susan Rice Thwarted Attempts to Capture Bin Laden – Was Bystander to Rwandan Genocide | The Gateway Pundit

Ambassador Susan Rice, who famously blamed the Benghazi terrorist strike on a YouTube video, has a long history of ineptitude.
It’s not a surprise then that Barack Obama thinks so highly of her.

Harvard economist explains why spending cuts are better than tax increases

Harvard economist explains why spending cuts are better than tax increases:
From Investors Business Daily, an editorial by Dr. Alberto Alesina which explains which approach to reducing debt and deficits works best. Is it cutting spending and reducing regulation? Or is it continuing to borrow and spend, and raising taxes?
Let’s see what Dr. Alesina says:
The evidence speaks loud and clear: When governments reduce deficits by raising taxes, they are indeed likely to witness deep, prolonged recessions. But when governments attack deficits by cutting spending, the results are very different.
In 2011, the International Monetary Fund identified episodes from 1980 to 2005 in which 17 developed countries had aggressively reduced deficits. The IMF classified each episode as either “expenditure-based” or “tax-based,” depending on whether the government had mainly cut spending or hiked taxes.
When Carlo Favero, Francesco Giavazzi and I studied the results, it turned out that the two kinds of deficit reduction had starkly different effects: cutting spending resulted in very small, short-lived — if any — recessions, and raising taxes resulted in prolonged recessions.
[...]The obvious economic challenge to our contention is: What keeps an economy from slumping when government spending, a major component of aggregate demand, goes down? That is, if the economy doesn’t enter recession, some other component of aggregate demand must necessarily be rising to make up for the reduced government spending — and what is it? The answer: private investment.
Our research found that private-sector capital accumulation rose after the spending-cut deficit reductions, with firms investing more in productive activities — for example, buying machinery and opening new plants. After the tax-hike deficit reductions, capital accumulation dropped.
The reason may involve business confidence, which, we found, plummeted during the tax-based adjustments and rose (or at least didn’t fall) during the expenditure-based ones. When governments cut spending, they may signal that tax rates won’t have to rise in the future, thus spurring investors (and possibly consumers) to be more active.
Our findings on business confidence are consistent with the broader argument that American firms, though profitable, aren’t investing or hiring as much as they might right now because they’re uncertain about future fiscal policy, taxation and regulation.
But there’s a second reason that private investment rises when governments cut spending: the cuts are often just part of a larger reform package that includes other pro-growth measures.
In another study, Silvia Ardagna and I showed that the deficit reductions that successfully lower debt-to-GDP ratios without sparking recessions are those that combine spending reductions with such measures as deregulation, the liberalization of labor markets (including, in some cases, explicit agreement with unions for more moderate wages) and tax reforms that increase labor participation.
Let’s be clear: This body of evidence doesn’t mean that cutting government spending always leads to economic booms. Rather, it shows that spending cuts are much less costly for the economy than tax hikes and that a carefully designed deficit-reduction plan, based on spending cuts and pro-growth policies, may completely eliminate the output loss that you’d expect from such cuts. Tax-based deficit reduction, by contrast, is always recessionary.
UPDATE: George Mason University economists agree: debt is wrecking the economy and the right way to stop it is with spending cuts, not tax increases. In order to grow the economy we need a balanced approach of spending cuts and tax cuts.
Excerpt:
The United States’ high levels of debt are already contributing to slower economic growth and decreased competitiveness. These impacts will worsen if the nation’s debt-to-GDP levels continue to rise, as is currently projected.
[...]High levels of government debt undermine U.S. competitiveness in several ways, including crowding out private investment, raising costs to private businesses, and contributing to both real and perceived macroeconomic instability.
[...]Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff examine historical data from 40 countries over 200 years and find that when a nation’s gross national debt exceeds 90% of GDP, real growth was cut by one percent in mild cases and by half in the most extreme cases. This result was found in both developing and advanced economies.
Similarly, a Bank for International Settlements study finds that when government debt in OECD countries exceeds about 85% of GDP, economic growth slows.
[...]While fundamental tax reform is required to correct a host of structural inefficiencies, policymakers can quickly reduce the U.S. statutory rate of 35% to the OECD average rate of 26% or less.
That’s what research tells us. But that’s not what we are doing, because we voted for Barack Obama. By the way, Dr. Alesina is a professor of political economics at Harvard University and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and he is citing his own published research. In the months and years to come, remember that we knew what the consequences would be to electing someone who disregards science – someone who is anti-scientific. We knew, and we did it anyway. And now we have to face the consequences for making the wrong decision.

Monday, November 19, 2012

Paradigms and Demographics: New York Misses Out on Natural Gas Revolution as Junk Science Carries the Day

Paradigms and Demographics: New York Misses Out on Natural Gas Revolution as Junk Science Carries the Day

With President Obama back in the White House next year, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is expected to roll out a new regulation to control drilling techniques used to access natural gas. Even so, the expected surge in U.S. oil production will likely outpace political paybacks to green groups that can be uprooted over time……At a time when New York’s budget deficit exceeds $8 billion, the economic rationale for natural gas development cannot be dismissed. But it is possible to cajole politicians and frighten the public on basis of junk science. The environmental organizations opposed to fracking incessantly claim that it opens the way to water contamination. Here are some key facts:……
………The Marcellus Shale cuts across New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia. It could potentially to help transform the world’s energy portfolio in manner that benefits America’s interest over the long-term. But this will require public policy decisions that rooted in sound science not unsubstantiated alarmism. 

Sunday, November 18, 2012

I Am Israel (Graphic)

I Am Israel (Graphic): Back in 2006 I had a post titled Why Israel is Right and the Palestinians are Wrong. It references an article by David Horowitz that explains the history and the facts of the middle east conflict, and proves that the so-called Palestinians are the aggressors in the conflict. Read it here.

America, Israel, Gaza, the World | Via Meadia

America, Israel, Gaza, the World | Via Meadia

In any case, when Israel brings the big guns and fast planes against Gaza’s popguns and low tech missiles, a great many Americans see nothing but common sense at work. These Americans aren’t mad about ‘disproportionate’ Israeli violence in Gaza because they don’t really accept the concept of proportionality in war. They think that if you have jus ad bellum, and rocket strikes from Gaza are definitely that, you get something close to a blank check when it comes to jus in bello.

If anything, rather than weakening American sympathy for Israel, Israel’s response in Gaza (and the global criticism that surrounds it) is likely to strengthen the bonds of respect and esteem that many Americans feel for Israelis. Far from seeing Israel’s use of overwhelming force against limited provocation as harsh or immoral, many Americans see it as courageous and wise. It strengthens the sense that in a wacky world where a lot of foreigners are hard to understand, the Israelis are honest, competent and reliable friends — good people to have on your side in a tight spot.

Protesting Spanish Cops: "Forgive Us For Not Arresting Those Truly Responsible For This Crisis: Bankers & Politicians" | ZeroHedge

Protesting Spanish Cops: "Forgive Us For Not Arresting Those Truly Responsible For This Crisis: Bankers & Politicians" | ZeroHedge

"Citizens! Forgive us for not arresting those truly responsible for this crisis: bankers and politicians."

And there you have the entire current clusterfuck summarized in one simple sentence: because as long as those responsible for the ongoing economic collapse, which will inevitably end in war as many have observed, Kyle Bass most recently, are not only not arrested but preserve their positions of power, any and all change will merely be cosmetic and any real change will only affect the bank accounts of the global middle class which are slowly but surely drained to zero.

It’s Economic Growth, Not Redistribution, that Lifts Everyone, Including the Poor - Peter Ferrara

It’s Economic Growth, Not Redistribution, that Lifts Everyone, Including the Poor - Peter Ferrara - [page]

Such sustained, rapid economic growth is the ultimate solution to poverty. It was economic growth in the last century that reduced U.S. poverty from roughly 50% in 1900, and 30% in 1950, to 12.1% in 1969. Among blacks, poverty was reduced in the 20th century from 3 in 4 to 1 in 4 through economic growth. Child poverty of 40% in the early 1950s was also reduced by half. It was economic growth that made the elimination of child labor possible as well.

The living standards of the poor in America today are equivalent to the living standards of the middle class 35 years ago, if not the middle class in Europe today. With sustained, vigorous economic growth, 35 years from now the lowest income Americans will live at least as well as the middle class of today.

Saturday, November 17, 2012

GEORGE WILL: A government agency answerable to no one – WaPo

GEORGE WILL: A government agency answerable to no one – WaPo:
By George F. Will, Published: November 16
There can be unseemly exposure of the mind as well as of the body, as the progressive mind is exposed in the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), a creature of the labyrinthine Dodd-Frank legislation. Judicial dismantling of the CFPB would affirm the rule of law and Congress’s constitutional role.
The CFPB’s director, Richard Cordray, was installed by one of Barack Obama’s spurious recess appointmentswhen the Senate was not in recess. Vitiating the Senate’s power to advise and consent to presidential appointments is congruent with the CFPB’s general lawlessness.
The CFPB nullifies Congress’s power to use the power of the purse to control bureaucracies because its funding — “determined by the director” — comes not from congressional appropriations but from the Federal Reserve. Untethered from all three branches of government, unlike anything created since 1789, the CFPB is uniquely sovereign: The president appoints the director for a five-year term — he can stay indefinitely, if no successor is confirmed — and the director can be removed, but not for policy reasons.
via George Will: A government agency answerable to no one – The Washington Post.

EPA (Once Again) Puts Green Lipstick on Agriculture Pig | Via Meadia

EPA (Once Again) Puts Green Lipstick on Agriculture Pig | Via Meadia

The ethanol boondoggle is one of the most costly of American government subsidies. It’s a case where clueless and naive greens were taken to the cleaners by greedy farm interests. And it looks like the ag lobby’s powers of enchantment over environmentalists are as strong as ever.

Friday, November 16, 2012

Female House Representatives: Women Are Equal But If You Criticize Them For Either Lying Or Being Used To Peddle A Lie You're Sexist

Female House Representatives: Women Are Equal But If You Criticize Them For Either Lying Or Being Used To Peddle A Lie You're Sexist

Some women apparently have the option of being Strong Capable Women or Weepy Defenseless Little Girls as convenience suits them.

Mark Steyn rips White House press corps 'court eunuchs' [AUDIO] | The Daily Caller

Mark Steyn rips White House press corps 'court eunuchs' [AUDIO] | The Daily Caller

“I don’t think they think about that at all,” Steyn said. “You can tell that at that press conference yesterday — the most stupid, ludicrous, embarrassing questions from the court eunuchs. The idiot from The New York Times asking a question on global warming? Some giggly little schoolgirl from Chicago wetting her knickers, saying she’s watched Obama win every time?” 

“I mean, you’re supposed to be grown men and women,” Steyn continued. “You made fools of yourselves. He gives his first press conference in whatever it is — in one, two, three, twelve years — and you don’t even think about extracting any meaningful information from him.”

Thursday, November 15, 2012

Northern Europe’s Economies Now Truly Infected | Via Meadia

Northern Europe’s Economies Now Truly Infected | Via Meadia

If these numbers don’t change soon, there will be nobody left capable of bailing out the euro, and no political leaders will have the flexibility or the money to move Europe ahead. That’s bad news for China, Japan, and the United States, which all face serious problems of their own. The omens for 2013 at this point are not all that we could wish.

2012: An Irrational Devotion to Secularism

2012: An Irrational Devotion to Secularism

Pundits say that Hispanics, single women, young people, and blacks delivered a victory for President Obama’s re-election. However, these are only external differences that do little to explain the internal unity that each group shares in their irrational devotion to secularism. The devotion is irrational because the reduced economic fruits (and social decay) it brings cannot be sustained, thereby threatening its ultimate survival.

Wednesday, November 14, 2012

Corrupt bargain with unions drove city to bankruptcy

Corrupt bargain with unions drove city to bankruptcy:



Reuters:

When this sun-drenched exurb east of Los Angeles filed for bankruptcy protection in August, the city attorney suggested fraudulent accounting was the root of the problem.

The mayor blamed a dysfunctional city council and greedy police and fire unions. The unions blamed the mayor. Even now, there is little agreement on how the city got into this crisis or how it can extricate itself.

"It's total political chaos," said John Husing, a former San Bernardino resident and regional economist. "There is no solution. They'll never fix anything."

Yet on close examination, the city's decades-long journey from prosperous, middle-class community to bankrupt, crime-ridden, foreclosure-blighted basket case is straightforward — and alarmingly similar to the path traveled by many municipalities around America's largest state. San Bernardino succumbed to a vicious circle of self-interests among city workers, local politicians and state pension overseers.

Little by little, over many years, the salaries and retirement benefits of San Bernardino's city workers — and especially its police and firemen — grew richer and richer, even as the city lost its major employers and gradually got poorer and poorer.

Unions poured money into city council elections, and the city council poured money into union pay and pensions. The California Public Employees' Retirement System (Calpers), which manages pension plans for San Bernardino and many other cities, encouraged ever-sweeter benefits. Investment bankers sold clever bond deals to pay for them. Meanwhile, state law made it impossible to raise local property taxes and difficult to boost any other kind.  (Emphasis added.)

No single deal or decision involving benefits and wages over the years killed the city. But cumulatively, they built a pension-fueled financial time-bomb that finally exploded.
... 
This corrupt bargain is why the State of California is also in decline and other blue states that allow government unions.  Unions should not be allowed to contribute to elections of people with whom they expect to bargain over pay and benefits, anymore than they should be able to pick their bosses at private companies.  This corrupt bargain should be addressed head on.  Candidates who are opposed by the unions should use it against their opponents.

Energy Independence the Free-Market Way

Energy Independence the Free-Market Way:
It was clear in pre-election discussion that Americans want energy independence. The most successful means to this end has been the free market—and the release of the International Energy Agency’s (IEA) annual World Energy Outlook proves it.
IEA projects that while global energy demand will climb, America will emerge as a net exporter of natural gas by 2020 and be “almost self sufficient in net terms by 2035.” Also by 2035: North America as a net oil exporter. The implications are enormous, both at home and abroad.
President Obama’s first-term vision of energy independence has been a combination of importing less oil, mandating less use of oil and other conventional fuels, and supplanting them with green energy programs and research.
The results are quite clearly illustrated by what is happening on federal lands, where production is down or nonexistent. Meanwhile, federal investment in green energy has skyrocketed. The IEA recognizes this trend by projecting the contribution of renewables to continue increasing as billions in subsidies and programs are spent to integrate them.
Nevertheless, the market and private-sector innovation have more than covered for the lost opportunities on federal lands. The natural gas boom witnessed by the nation was brought to bear in states like North Dakota, where state and local governments have safely regulated hydraulic fracturing. They have also allowed room for entrepreneurs to develop an energy supply that has turned former projections of natural gas supplies upside-down.
Subsidizing the use of more renewable energy is not the guaranteed path to energy independence that many in Washington claim it is. Further, making the most of America’s energy supply does not require more government programs and incentives. It calls for common sense: letting those who stand to gain and lose the most take the business risks needed to advance energy production and innovation.
On the regulatory side, this means turning over more authority to states, which can more efficiently and appropriately manage (often non-competing) energy and environment concerns.
The IEA report shows that America does not have a dearth of energy. Nor is it the role of the federal government to direct the American energy economy toward a certain vision of energy independence. The goal instead should be to create and protect an environment that allows people to pursue all of America’s energy resources.
It’s time Washington adjusted its thinking to this huge influx of energy natural resources and let the market do its work.

Culture, Education, the Media, and the Romney Loss...

Culture, Education, the Media, and the Romney Loss...: by: Les Carpenter
Rational Nation USA
Liberty
-vs- Tyranny



The following excerpt from an article written by William Bennett is thought provoking. As the nation adjusts to the demographic changes it is undergoing it would be well if the issues Mr. Bennett talks about are placed on the academic and politic tables for discussion. While few will agree with everything he writes it remains there is validity in much of what he says.

CNN ...Rather than offer a broad sweeping vision for the country, Democrats played identity politics. Republicans were the culprits, and women, young adults, black, Latinos, etc... were the victims. And voters believed it. Why? For the same reason this litany -- gender, race, ethnicity, class -- sound so familiar.

Voters believed it, not because it was something new or groundbreaking, but because this has been the template of many of our character-building institutions -- our public schools, our colleges, and public universities -- for the past 50 years. Go to any major university in America and this is the mindset that is taught, preached, and ingested. It also gets an assist from television drama, from the movies, and from much of the mainstream media.

For decades liberals have succeeded in defining the national discourse, the terms of discussion, and, therefore, the election, in these terms. They have successfully set the parameters and focus of the national and political dialogue as predominantly about gender, race, ethnicity, and class. This is the paradigm, the template through which many Americans, probably a majority, more or less view the world, our country, and the election. It is a divisive strategy and Democrats have targeted and exploited those divides.

How else can we explain that more young people now favor socialism to capitalism?

According to a Pew Research poll taken last year, 49% of Americans age 18-29 have a positive view of socialism while just 46% have a positive view of capitalism. Such a view has roots.

So while we Republicans opine about election strategies and changing demographics, and appropriately so as that is our immediate order of business, in the long run we must address the problem at its source: the culture.

Politics are downstream from the culture. Plato summarized the two most important questions in a society: Who teaches the young and what do we teach them?... (Emphasis mine.) {Read More}

Food for thought. Truly thoughtful individuals will seriously consider Mr. Bennett points.

Via: Memeorandum

We’re Too Nice « Blogs For Victory

We’re Too Nice « Blogs For Victory

I have sat back over the last week watching the expected gloating from liberals, and the anticipated disbelief amongst conservatives and have let it all soak in, in my own attempt to make some sense out of the nonsensical. I still find it hard to believe that once again this country has elected an empty suit, no more qualified to be President this time around than he was last time. I still find it hard to believe that so many voters put issues like abortion and gay marriage above their own financial interests, confirming my belief that we have become a very ignorant, financially illiterate society who will now forsake opportunity and liberty for promised personal security. Americans have truly become dependent and intellectually lazy, and the question is – is it too late to salvage them?

The evidence shows that welfare hurts the poor - The Commentator

The evidence shows that welfare hurts the poor - The Commentator

The welfare state traps people in dependency. People in that situation naturally worry about who will take care of them, making them susceptible to social populists

Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Latest Prager University Course Crushes Opponents of Capital Punishment

Latest Prager University Course Crushes Opponents of Capital Punishment

"Keeping every murderer alive only cheapens human life because it belittles murder," he says in the course video. "When it come to the death penalty for murder, the gulf is unbridgeable between those of us who believe some murderers ... should be executed, and those who believe that no murderer ... should ever be put to death." 

Monday, November 12, 2012

Brussels Axes Christmas Tree so Muslims Won’t Be Offended

Brussels Axes Christmas Tree so Muslims Won’t Be Offended:
In the capital of the European Union, Brussels Belgium, the Muslim population (an estimated 25 percent of the city) is is becoming more strongly felt. Immigrant shock troops like Sharia4Belgium have announced their intention to implement Islamic law.
Part of the road-kill on the way to Muslims’ worldwide caliphate is mowing down the traditions of all other religions. So non-Islamic items like Christmas trees are not acceptable, and if the infidels want to maintain an illusion of peace, they must suffer the indignities of increasing acts of appeasement. Today the Muslims are offended by Christmas trees, but there’s an endless supply of ideas that the sensitive Sons of Allah find annoying.
It’s not a small sacrifice for Belgians to trade their beautiful Christmas tree for a meaningless secular replacement. The tree, and accompanying Christmas market near the Town Hall, comprise a popular event for locals and tourists alike.
image
On the other hand, historic Brussels is not what it used to be, given the influx of immigrant diversity. Brussels is now one of the most dangerous cities in Europe, with twice the crime of Frankfurt, according to the TV news clip below. Police cannot control the crime, even during the day, to the point where locals have organized citizens’ patrols to at least keep watch. Expensive shops do not escape violent thieves despite more police. One Belgian observed that crime has gotten a lot worse in the last 10 years. (Video Transcript.)
Here’s more background about the Christmas tree controversy:
Brussels Bans ‘Offensive’ Christmas Tree For Muslims, TheRightPerspective.org, November 10, 2012

Beware the anti energy left

Beware the anti energy left:



Sometimes the revolution politicians seek isn't the one they get. Consider the irony—and the opportunity—in Monday's report that the U.S. is likely to surpass Saudi Arabia as the world's largest oil producer as early as 2020.
...
The biggest potential threat may come from federal regulation in Mr. Obama's second term. Though he tried to take credit for the fracking revolution in his second debate with Mitt Romney, his EPA has long wanted to supplant state regulators and will grab any opportunity to do so. Perhaps the election of pro-fracking Democrats like soon-to-be Senator Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota (home to the monster Bakken Shale field) can give the new energy revolution some needed bipartisan buy-in. 
Historians will one day marvel that so much political and financial capital was invested in a green-energy revolution at the very moment a fossil fuel revolution was aborning. But politicians failing to spot the trend until they start taking credit for it is an old story. Let's hope they don't ruin it now that they've noticed.
...
The left's energy Luddites is desperate to stop the new oil and gas boom and they have an ally in Obama who just put shale deposits in the Western US off limits.  It is hard to imagine a less intelligent move except there is always ANWR where restrictions have also kept oil from being extracted.  There is this notion on the left that if we restrict the domestic production of oil and gas it will hasten the adaptation of less efficient alternative energy technology.  They have been pushing this idea for decades and in the meantime they have been outsourcing our energy needs to hostile countries and reducing our standard of living.



But windmills and solar panels do not create sufficient fuel to meet our transportation needs and probably never will.  We need to accept that reality and let the oil and gas industry create good paying jobs in this country.

PJ Lifestyle » It’s the Culture, Stupid: Facing the Long Road Ahead

PJ Lifestyle » It’s the Culture, Stupid: Facing the Long Road Ahead

If we can turn away from the elections for a moment, and the future of the Republican Party, a more fundamental problem exists. It is nothing less than the nature of the American culture. By the term “culture,” I am not referring to the social issues that usually come up when one talks about culture wars; i.e., abortion, gay rights, religion, etc. Rather, I am talking about the perception and outlook that stand beneath the way our American public define the very nature of civic life in our democratic capitalist society.

Free Market Morality - Economics - Prager University

Free Market Morality - Economics - Prager University

Is the free market morally superior or inferior to other economic systems? If it's morally superior, what makes it so? If it's morally inferior, do we need greater government control of the economy? Walter Williams, renowned Professor of Economics at George Mason University, faces these questions head on and with bracing clarity.

America has become an Old World country - Telegraph

America has become an Old World country - Telegraph

So Europe got the American president it wanted – the one who would present no threat to its own delusions. The United States is now officially one of us: an Old World country complete with class hatred, ethnic Balkanisation, bourgeois guilt and a paternalist ruling elite. And it is locked into the same death spiral of high public spending and self-defeating wealth redistribution as we are. Welcome to the future, and the beginning of what may turn out to be the terminal decline of the West.

Saturday, November 10, 2012

Paradigms and Demographics: The coming environmental battlegrounds - Green agenda threatens economic future

Paradigms and Demographics: The coming environmental battlegrounds - Green agenda threatens economic future

Will President Obama, Democrats and executive branch agencies be receptive to bipartisan approaches — to institutionalizing all-of-the-above energy decisions that make scientific, economic, environmental and technological sense? Or will they be even more entrenched, knowing the White House can act via executive decree if Congress does nothing?
The answer will determine whether the United States becomes an economic powerhouse once again or an enormous Greece. Blessed with more oil, gas and coal than almost any other nation on earth, we must not refuse to develop these resources.

President Obama Closes Western Land To Oil Shale Development

President Obama Closes Western Land To Oil Shale Development

If President Obama was really serious about what he calls an all-of-the-above approach to energy policy, he would abandon his efforts to demonize oil companies and cutting them off from federal lands. If he was really serious, he would give control of those federal lands back to the states, to which the ultimately belong, and he would focus on finding sources of alternative energy that have a chance of working. Giving federally backed loans to his campaign donors and watching their companies go bankrupt isn’t going to work.

Thursday, November 8, 2012

GayPatriot » Disturbing that Obama won by distorting and demonizing

GayPatriot » Disturbing that Obama won by distorting and demonizing

That’s one of the things which makes our defeat this week so troubling. The challenger had the more upbeat message and lost.  The incumbent instead misrepresented his opponent’s record and attacked his background.

He won by demonizing.  And that is just not a pleasant thought.

Anne R. Pierce : America Needs a Renaissance

Anne R. Pierce : America Needs a Renaissance:
Progressives have been working for a long time to change the culture from the inside out. No revolution necessary: Just run for political office on a moderate political platform, then change the very structure and meaning of government once in office. Just make sure children spend ever increasing hours in schools at an ever younger age, then teach them – again and again and again– how to become global citizens. Just use movies and television shows to make conservatives look foolish and mean. Just emphasize the â€Å“news” that makes liberal politicians look good. Just create a bureaucratic super-structure that can promote the agenda, even when conservatives are in office. Just marginalize the Western tradition, the founding ideas, and the great books and marginalize professors and teachers who take them seriously. Once you've done all this, claim to be the only able representatives of America’s intellectual, artistic, and literary life (Conservatives, by contrast, can then be portrayed as narrow-minded capitalists with little regard for culture.)
There you have it. You’ve not only transformed America; you’ve convinced much of America that you are the only ones sensitive and smart enough to guide it. You are the new elite, and your conservative opponents even do you the favor of calling you such. But the â€Å“culture” you created isn’t working out so well. A cursory look at our movies, our television shows, our anxious and overwhelmed children and teenagers, our pathologies, our addictions, our dearth of historical knowledge, our dumbed-down society, our increased willingness to let the end justify the means and to find excuses for irresponsible, violent and abusive behavior, reveals that we are a culture in trouble.
Years ago, I realized the depth of change in our schools and institutions and saw how it was transforming childhood. I kept asking friends, â€Å“Shouldn’t we protest when schools subject our children to indoctrination exercises, and routinely send teachers to seminars on how to promote social and political causes? Shouldn’t we question history textbooks that are so thoroughly re-written that the founding principles, the birth of the United States, and the dangers of communism and fascism are all but forgotten? What will happen to our country when these kids reach voting age?” But most parents seemed more concerned about their children’s outward displays of accomplishment than about their children’s actual moral and intellectual advancement. As long as their children were getting good grades, excelling in â€Å“activities,” and building good resumes, parents didn’t want to rock the boat.
Thus, American schools choose curriculums with immunity. Captive students are continually reminded of the low points of American history and taught to look at American history â€Å“critically.” They receive little, if any, instruction on the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, or the spirit of liberty. American society, they are told, is still dominated by racism, sexism and class distinctions. Classic literature is replaced with 'edgy' works that drive home the same message. In multicultural festivals and in â€Å“cultural studies” textbooks, however, students experience upbeat portrayals of other cultures. Little or nothing is said about the oppression, poverty and restrictions on freedom in many of the far-off lands they celebrate.
Rather than being permitted to appreciate that America, at its best, unleashes human potential and champions human rights, students are asked to identify their â€Å“cultural roots,” the implication being that any â€Å“roots” worth having are non-American ones. The modern concept of cultural identity thus, ironically, contributes to children’s sense of uprootedness. It takes the ground out from under them by implying that the ground they are standing on is not theirs. It belongs to some "other"  (I.E., the affluent white male). Children are taught to seek their identity as a distinct caste - resisting and even despising the American norm. That this is the teaching of alienation and that it is particularly discouraging to children in our inner cities is rarely addressed. As conservatives reach out to ethnic groups, they must address the problem of an education that denies our common American bond.
Alongside of the program for political change is the program for moral change, and it relies upon similar tactics: Use the media; make anyone who doesn’t agree with the wholesale rejection of tradition look mean and stupid; teach children to question the outmoded ‘values” of their parents.  Toward this end, saturate society with so much crudeness and crassness that we're finally incapable of being shocked. Mock the idea of virtue. After all, how much change can be achieved if people don’t embrace the idea that each culture defines its own good -- and that the current culture’s definition is the best so far?
I was going to title this piece, â€Å“It’s Our Turn to Change the Culture.” But change is easy. A renaissance is going to be hard. We must study the best traditions for inspiration, while being open to the best innovations. We must seek and find intellectual, cultural, political, and moral rebirth. It’s time for people who take the lessons of history and the idea of America seriously to step up and speak up –even if it requires questioning those â€Å“elite” universities we’d like our children to attend. The answer to the conservative’s current quandary is not to be more current. It is to be more brave.
  

America goes into the darkness | Melanie Phillips

America goes into the darkness | Melanie Phillips

Romney lost because he refused to provide an alternative to any of this for fear of being labelled a warmonger, flint-heart or social reactionary. He refused to engage with any of the issues that made this Presidential election so truly momentous. Up against the bullying of the totalitarian left, he ran for cover. He played safe, and as a result only advertised his own weakness and dishonesty. Well, voters can smell inconsistency from a mile away; they call it untrustworthiness, and they are right.   

Romney lost because, like Britain’s Conservative Party, the Republicans just don’t understand that America and the west are being consumed by a culture war. In their cowardice and moral confusion, they all attempt to appease the enemies within. And from without, the Islamic enemies of civilisation stand poised to occupy the void.

With the re-election of Obama, America now threatens to lead the west into a terrifying darkness.

Articles: A Few Things I Never Want to Hear Again

Articles: A Few Things I Never Want to Hear Again

No more apologies.  No more embarrassment.  No more veiled language when on the big stage.  The left won the day by making the most radical, anti-human irrationalism of this epoch seem safe and normal, while portraying freedom and individualism as the dangerous, radical path.

The electoral battle between leftism and liberty is lost, and perhaps will now remain so for a good long time, regardless of the name of the winning party in any given election.

The moral war, however, is still in its early stages.  It is an educational war, which means a war of ideas, which means a civilizational war.  It is going to get ugly, and we are going to lose more battles than we win.  As you know, however, the ultimate victor is the side that wins the last battle.

"Forward"?  Bring it on.

Barbaric Fragmentation: John Courtney Murray Foresaw the U.S. United in Confusion | Crisis Magazine

Barbaric Fragmentation: John Courtney Murray Foresaw the U.S. United in Confusion | Crisis Magazine

Barbarism, in other words, threatens whenever rational standards of judgment fail, when “men cannot be locked together in argument,” for civilization itself is formed by the locking of argument. No reason, no conversation; no conversation, no argument; no argument, no civilization, Murray suggests. Or at least no civilization in the sense of a “civil multitude,” a people formed with an “identity as a people … endowed with its vital form … its sense of purpose as a collectivity organized for action in history.”

From the vantage point of the calm (and historical) analysis provided by Murray and John Paul II, we can read the current hand-wringing about polarization and clichéd calls for unity with a quite substantial grain of salt, for we have forged a very deep unity as a people, one committed to creating a secular technological heaven of individual autonomy.

And if that comes at the expense of a new barbarism, so be it.

Wednesday, November 7, 2012

The people have spoken … and they must be punished

The people have spoken … and they must be punished:
After he was defeated for re-election in 1989, New York Mayor Ed Koch was asked if he would ever run for office again.  “No,” Koch replied.  “The people have spoken … and they must be punished.”
Well, it’s November 2012, and the people have spoken.  Here’s how they will be punished.
Exit polls show that by a margin of 52-43, Americans want less government, not more. By a margin of 63-33 they do not want to raise taxes to balance the budget.  And by a margin of 49-45, they want Obamacare either partially or entirely repealed.  None of those wishes will be honored.  Instead:
1.    Obamacare will now become a permanent feature of the American political landscape.  It will never be repealed.
2.    The unprecedented levels of spending in Obama’s first four years will become the new floor, as America sets new records for fiscal profligacy and debt.
3.    Job creators will face massive tax increases, and more Americans will come off the tax rolls—resulting in fewer citizens with a stake in keeping taxes low and more with a stake in protecting benefits.
4.    Government dependency, already at record levels, will continue to grow.
5.    Four lost years in dealing with the entitlement crisis will become eight—digging us into a hole from which we may not be able to emerge.
6.    Obama, unworried about the impact of gas and electricity prices on his reelection, will finally wage the regulatory war on fossil fuels the Left demands.
7.    He will unleash the Environmental Protection Agency to impose crushing new burdens on U.S. business.
8.    His administration’s assault on religious freedom will go on and expand to new areas.
9.    The Defense Department will be gutted, with cuts so deep that America will no longer be a superpower.
10.    Obama will almost certainly have the opportunity to appoint more liberal Supreme Court justices, possibly replacing conservatives on the high court — ending the Roberts court in all but name for a generation.
And that’s only the beginning. Welcome to Obama’s second term.

The Day After the Election

The Day After the Election:
By Alan Caruba
My mail the day after the election was filled with vituperation from the Left. Words like “kike” and “scumbag” were just some that I encountered. I welcome their disdain.
The Left is triumphant, but they do not see that “sequestration” is coming to further erode the power of our military and the consequences that will flow from that. They do not see the skyrocketing taxes that will be imposed on Americans.
The Left has always lived in a utopia of the leveling of all earnings, the nanny state government that will control everything they to. They want a hand-out, not the hard work of lifting oneself out of poverty and dependency. That will be the fate of a complacent middle class.
Norman Thomas, the former U.S. Socialist Party presidential candidate in the 1940s said, “The American people will never knowingly adopt Socialist. But, under the name of ‘liberalism’, they will adopt every fragment of the Socialist program, until one day America will be a socialist nation, without knowing how it happened.” That day has arrived.
Winston Churchill said, “Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery.”
America is a very different place from the nation in which I was fortunate to be born. The demographics have changed dramatically. Earlier generations, starting especially in the late 1800s were composed of people who fled Europe and Russia for the dream of freedom and opportunity. That generation has died off and been replaced by those whose children have been indoctrinated in school systems that stressed all the worst values of socialism and communism.
It didn’t happen overnight. Our education system has been purposefully degraded to a point where self-esteem has replaced the need to personally strive for excellence. The school books that our children read have been censored to turn our Founding Fathers into just a bunch of slave owners and “white old men.”
The millions who voted for Obama are unaware of the impact that “sequestration” will have on them in the form of the Left’s answer to everything, higher taxes. It will, however, further erode our military power and that bodes ill for America and well for its enemies.
My crystal ball tells me that Israel will likely launch an attack on Iran to avoid a second Holocaust; this time of the Jewish state. Arabs, cowards at heart, are not likely to respond. The Persians will be too dazed to know what hit them.
The Islamic frenzy that has seized the Middle East and Africa’s northwestern tier of Maghreb nations will, however, continue to spread. That will pose a greater threat to Europe. The U.S. dollar is already faring poorly, however, against the Euro, a currency in decline thanks to its embrace of socialism.
Just as with the aftermath of World War I and the treaty of Versailles, we are likely facing some very ugly times as various despots seize or expand power to advance their totalitarian aspirations.
America will be seriously challenged by China in the Pacific sphere. Our military cannot fight a war in two theatres and Americans, as in the past, will resist engagement unless the homeland is attacked as it was in 1941. They will discover we have too few ships and too few aircraft.
At home we are likely to see an expansion of the Homeland Security Agency and surveillance that knows every call you make and every post you put on Facebook and other social sites. The intimidation will be intense and it would not surprise me to learn that secret arrests occur.
There will be rule by executive order as the President seeks to bypass Congress. Americans who have believe that they are protected by the Bill of Rights and rule of law will discover they aren’t.
The national debt, already at $16 trillion now exceeds our Gross Domestic Product by two trillion more than all the money generated by our goods and services. It will increase until nations decide the dollar is no longer the reserve currency of the world. You will be able to wallpaper your bedroom and bath with dollar bills that will be worthless.
An avalanche of regulations by the Environmental Protection Agency will cause those companies that can to move their operations overseas, taking much-needed jobs with them. The rest of us will be dictated to regarding every purchase we make. Everything will become expensive.
The nation’s healthcare system will deteriorate with long lines for treatment, if treatment is even permitted if you have a long-term condition of disease or disability. Senior citizens will be "permitted" to die.
Anyone who is a member of the Tea Party or believed to be a “lover of freedom” will be at risk. Even returning veterans will be subject to arrest as a risk to the government. Just being a veteran will become a risk.
Morally, the nation is sliding into the abyss of same-sex marriage, lax laws regarding the use of illegal drugs, and parents will discover they no longer have a say over how they raise their children. Families are at risk in this new America.
The estimated 23 million Americans out of work will be joined by millions more. A college degree, including PhDs, will increasingly become of little value.
There will be riots, often race-based. The African-American population will continue its slide into despondency and dependency. Hispanics will wonder why their parents moved here.
Any nation in the hands of a Democratic Party that jeered the inclusion of God in their platform will rue the day it permitted them to gain control.
Yes, it is a grim, but I believe this is a realistic picture of the future and I don’t see alternative scenarios for the near future short of massive rejection in the next midterm elections.
As a friend of mine put it, "Half the voters choose a form of national suicide. The other half was murdered."
It is a triumph of the stupid, the lazy, the mob.
Older Americans already wonder what happened to the Republic. Younger ones will never know why it was a place for which millions sacrificed their lives to protect and preserve, a far happier place.
© Alan Caruba, 2012
Alan Caruba blogs daily at http://factsnotfantasy.blogspot.com. An author, business and science writer, he is the founder of The National Anxiety Center.

Obamaholics Anonymous

Obamaholics Anonymous:
The country’s fiscal and international problems were not solved with last night’s narrow re-election of Barack Obama. But thanks in large part to the unceasing work of a sympathetic media serving as an unpaid arm of the Democratic Party, a majority of voters chose the path for which far too many alcoholics opt that invariably leads to their own destruction, and to the destruction of those around them. They fail to take the first step, which is to admit we have a problem.
A majority of voters last night do not recognize, yet, and probably will not, at least until a majority see the impact of Obamacare, the debt crisis, coming stagflation, and an increase in threats around the world due to our weakened foreign policy and emaciated military capacity. In short, we haven’t hit rock bottom. Unfortunately, the impact of the President’s policies the last four years may make that abundantly clear in 2016. But we as conservatives can’t count on that. We do have to take the first step to recovery in our own right, which is admit we have a problem, and that is messaging.
Whomever our standard-bearer in the next election cycle might be, that individual will face enormous challenges, besides what damage the Democrats do to the country on policy. The simple message of individual responsibility and achievement is no longer a winning message. It’s the right idea, but too many people are now rejecting it because they’re addicted to government handouts, and they’re convinced of a false promise that the rich carrying a bigger burden will lower theirs. But that’s not all. We have to face a demograhic reality that Mark Steyn has warned about, and go back to the drawing board on outreach.
The Democratic party will not run Joe Biden as the nominee in 2016. It will either be a Latino or a woman. We have to field a candidate who shares our common beliefs as a movement, but who would feel equally at home on Univision as they do on Fox News. We need to field candidate, at all levels of national office, who will not be so undisciplined in their messaging, they deliver a bludgeon to be used against them with women on the abortion front. We simply have to get smarter and better. The mainstream media will never clean up our mess. We will only get one chance.
I am not here to say here’s all the solutions to what ails the conservative movement. All I can say is I’m Duane Patterson, and I am a conservative. Or should be be Yo me llamo Duane Patterson, y yo soy conservador.

What Happened | @ActonInstitute PowerBlog

What Happened | @ActonInstitute PowerBlog

What is also clear is that the moral and spiritual demographics of the United States have changed considerably.  If Gov. Mitt Romney, an honorable man of moderate political preferences and conservative personal convictions, cannot attract a winning coalition we are in deep trouble.  His loss illustrates the change that has occurred in the nation and the challenges it portends. 

Mendacity and Malice Won - By Mary Matalin - The Corner - National Review Online

Mendacity and Malice Won - By Mary Matalin - The Corner - National Review Online

What happened? A political narcissistic sociopath leveraged fear and ignorance with a campaign marked by mendacity and malice rather than a mandate for resurgence and reform. Instead of using his high office to articulate a vision for our future, Obama used it as a vehicle for character assassination, replete with unrelenting and destructive distortion, derision, and division.

One Election Cannot Fix What Ails Us

One Election Cannot Fix What Ails Us:
Others will wade into the high grass of political strategy, demographics, and “ground games” to pronounce on the whys and wherefores of the results of this election in a far more competent manner that I am capable. My focus is on a broader, deeper, and I would argue, more critical dimension of what these results may mean. In that regard, I would observe three things:
1. Americans give signs of moving in a morally and politically more progressive direction, by which I mean that the appeal to the wisdom of past ages and tradition is simply not as compelling as it once was. People today, not all, but many, seem to want the trappings of the tradition (the white gown at the wedding), but not its obligations (chastity before it), thus indicating they would rather live off the legacy of the past than work to create a new and enduring legacy for the future.
Keep reading this post . . .

Hitting Bottom

Hitting Bottom: I can't help but think that America is now like your brother who can't keep a job, drinks too much, is constantly asking for money, and oh, has a crazy bad addiction that's destroying his life.



You tried just lending him money every time he promised to go straight but he just ain't gonna' do it. At some point you accept that he's going to have to hit bottom. You don't know what bottom looks like but you know that he's racing towards it. It might be jail, death, brain damage. Nobody knows. But at some point he'll hear the thud and wake up face first in a pool of his own vomit and he'll have to make the decision to turn over and get back up or just die.



And that's where America is heading. This country is going to have to go absolutely bankrupt and hit bottom before it starts getting better. This country is borrowing money from children that they're killing in the womb in record numbers. That, is not a recipe for success.



And of the children that we do have, many of them are being born into single parent homes where their chances of spending some time in jail are increased while their economic outlook is severely diminished.



For too many years we slept. Maybe we saw it coming, maybe we just suspected that everything was going to hell.



Leftists have taken over our education establishment, giving them firm control over what our children learn (unless you homeschool or have a great Catholic or private school). The left has long controlled the media and therefore control what people hear about current events. So think about it, they have control over the teaching of history and the present.



And why didn't we think we were going to be routed? And what did we do to prevent this? We talked about school choice but got weak kneed when the fight got bloody. We snarked about the media and congratulated ourselves on how many interesting and funny ways we tweeted that Chris Matthews was stupid. Here's the thing, pretty much everyone in the media agrees with him. It's an MSNBC media. Some just hide it a little better.



If you want to understand the true power of the media, this election is a prime example. The media propped up a corrupt and egotistical ideologue throughout this entire campaign. They ignored Solyndra. They ignored Benghazi. They covered up the economic ruin we were inviting on ourselves. Sure, FoxNews and the new media have hurt the media establishment but what the MSM showed in this election is that we can snark it up all we want, they've got one hand firmly on the levers of power and the other around our throats.



But here's the thing. I've gotten to the point now where I'm thinking about the fact that I have five kids, a wonderful wife, and a good parish. My life is good and full of love. We try to give to charity and work with a home for unwed mothers. We'll continue with these things. I'm focusing on what I can do in my life. I'll continue to write and work but I know where this country is heading.



I know where the country is going. I'm not going there and neither is my family. The Church will continue to exist whatever happens to this country. The country's barreling downwards and when it hits bottom it's going to explode like shrapnel. My job is to protect my family from the flying pieces. And then we'll start gathering the pieces.



*subhead*Pieces.*subhead*

In a Nation of Children, Santa Claus Wins - The Rush Limbaugh Show

In a Nation of Children, Santa Claus Wins - The Rush Limbaugh Show

I'm sorry.  In a country of children where the option is Santa Claus or work, what wins?  And say what you want, but Romney did offer a vision of traditional America.  In his way, he put forth a great vision of traditional America, and it was rejected. It was rejected in favor of a guy who thinks that those who are working aren't doing enough to help those who aren't.  And that resonated. 

neo-neocon » Blog Archive » The day after

neo-neocon » Blog Archive » The day after

It’s easy to say “we need to take back education and take back the media,” but it’s a lot harder to figure out how to do that. But I am convinced that, until that happens, we will not be winning many elections nationwide.

13 million fewer people voted in 2012 than in 2008

13 million fewer people voted in 2012 than in 2008: Here's something very strange, which a reader pointed out. According to Wikipedia, Obama received 60,048,411 votes (50.3 percent) and Romney received 57,368,285 votes (48.1 percent).
Yet in 2008,
Obama got 69,456,897 votes (52.9 percent) and McCain got 59,934,814 (45.7 percent).
How is it possible, with the U.S. population constantly increasing, mainly due to immigration, that almost 130 million people voted in 2008, and only 117 million voted in 2012?

Also, if these figures are correct, where was Romney's famous "ground game," designed to start with the 2008 McCain voters and build on that base?



I read another article (too lazy to find the link) that said Romney got less votes than McCain.

Coulter, Ingraham debate how Romney lost election [AUDIO] | The Daily Caller

Coulter, Ingraham debate how Romney lost election [AUDIO] | The Daily Caller

But in the end, with all the variables that should have been working against the incumbent president, Coulter said Obama’s re-election is a sign the country may have reached a tipping point.

Two Americas - Michael Barone - National Review Online

Two Americas - Michael Barone - National Review Online

The culturally cohesive America of the 1950s that some of us remember, usually glossing over racial segregation and the civil-rights movement, is no longer with us and hasn’t been for some time.

That was an America of universal media, in which everyone watched one of three similar TV channels and newscasts every night. Radio, 1930s and 1940s movies, and 1950s and early-1960s television painted a reasonably true picture of what was typically American.

That’s not the America we live in now. Niche media has replaced universal media.

One America listens to Rush Limbaugh, the other to NPR. Each America has its favorite cable news channel

The permanent sunset of the Republican party is begun

The permanent sunset of the Republican party is begun: The short answer: the 2012 election forms a Rubicon that, now having been crossed, this country will never cross back. Forget all the pundit talk (like Ed Rollins this morning on Fox) that elections go through cycles and this one was just another example. Forget the mid-terms of 2010. Forget the Tea party; it's finished forever.

The basic, fundamental nature and character of the American electorate has changed, and will not be changed back. Ever. The Republican Party can foresee nothing but diminishment  henceforth. There are no rising superstars who can save it. Jindal? Nope. Rubio? Nope. Rand Paul? Nope. Paul Ryan? He's done already. And there is absolutely no Republican whom Romney ran against in the primaries who has a ghost of a chance in the future.

What every Republican from Speaker John Boehner down doesn't get is that this election ("close" as it's being called, but it was not close) really shows that the Republican Party does not matter any more. For the next four years, no one will care what Boehner has to say about any issue.

The election's winner
Why? This morning an 85-year-old World War II veteran told me the most succinct analysis of the election that I have heard: "The people voted for Santa Claus, not Scrooge."

Forget the split of the votes cast: What the data really show is that a super-majority of the American people either do not care (non-voters) or want the government's free stuff to continue. Overall voter turnout was significantly less this year than in 2008, with tens of millions of eligible voters not voting, meaning that Romney's loss (Obama's vote plus non-voters) was absolutely crushing.

There is no way the Republican Party can reinvent itself to overcome this deficit. Facts are facts: The Republicans presently can count on exactly one voting bloc:
  • White men
That's it. Any parsing you read about income brackets, education or anything else don't mean squat compared to the fact that the only reliable voting bloc for Republicans today is white men, and not all of them by far. Start playing taps, though: White men are demographically the fastest-shrinking voting bloc of all.

On the other hand, the Democrats simply own the following voting blocs:
  • Women
    • Married, employed women broke for Romney, but single women of all ages broke for Obama, especially unmarried women with children.
    • Obama won a larger percentage of women's votes than Romney did of men's votes.
    • The fastest-growing women's demographic is unmarried women and right behind them, unmarried women with children. This is a permanent demographic shift. Today, 40 percent of all childbirths are to unmarried women. 
    • Years to come will see ever-fewer women's votes being cast for Republicans and because women voters outnumber male voters by several percentage points, the gap is larger than it seems.
  • Blacks
  • Hispanics
  • Other minorities generally
Understand that the traditional Republican appeal to fiscal discipline, America's founding principles, self sufficiency, decreased corporate regulations and lower taxes will never turn any of the Democrat blocs toward the Republicans in any but trivial numbers. There will never be a future equivalent of Reagan Democrats.

The Republican Part cannot stay true to its historical principles and win again. No matter who is the Democrat nominee in 2016, no matter the state of the economy, no Republican will win the White House without presenting himself as a Democrat-lite. But why will people vote for a Democrat-lite when they can vote for Democrat-heavy?

I am tempted to say that only a severe national-security crisis will turn the electorate toward a Republican candidate again. But I yield not to that temptation.

Goodbye, party of Lincoln. It was fun while it lasted. Last one out turn out the lights.

Before Democrat voters rejoice, they should soberly consider what this means:
  • A permanent decline in your standard of living and especially that of your children,
  • A permanently-growing federal government, consuming growing proportions of America's wealth,
  • And expanding government control or outright ownership of the country's financial activity,
  • Per-capita shrinkage of economic activity,
  • An expansive federal bureaucracy, with exponentially exploding regulatory authority over the way you live your daily lives in ways you cannot even imagine yet,
  • Great and greater restrictions on your freedoms to say what you want, do what you want, possess what you want, except you will have federally-funded sex lives without restriction, because Democrats think that you will acquiesce to being stripped you of all your freedoms without protest as long as they pay for your sex. And they are right. You will gladly sell your liberty for a censure-less roll in the hay. 
  • Diminishment of your health and shorter life spans because Obamacare is absolutely designed for the benefit of government and its licensed financial allies, not you,
  • Expanding federal debt almost without end, meaning that even as your own personal income falls, you will pay an ever-higher proportion of it in taxes of one kind or another (but don't worry, you will gladly drink the Kool-Aid that only "the rich" are paying more taxes),
  • "Almost without end," because the end will come to the gravy train, and it will be truly apocalyptic when it does. "Chaos" does not even begin to describe it; in fact, chaos will be the best outcome you can expect. Oh, when this happens (when, not if) you will lose absolutely everything you own. Ev. Ry. Thing. Because there is no one to bail America out.
But remember: you asked for it on Nov. 6, 2012. As H. L. Mencken said, "Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard." You just got what you want. The hard part that you cannot even fathom is now being born. 

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How we have lost America and put ourselves under the power of leftists, aliens, and parasites who intend our harm

How we have lost America and put ourselves under the power of leftists, aliens, and parasites who intend our harm: Instead of posting something new this morning, I will re-post the following entry from November 2, which says it all:



Why this election is very bad news, no matter who wins

The fact that such a failed, irresponsible, unworthy, lying, leftist, anti-American president is in such a tight race against such a plausible and competent opponent, instead of facing the certainty of a Carter-type repudiation by the electorate, is a very sobering indicator of the state of our country. It confirms the view, held by some on the right, that America has already been transformed into a different country, a country in which blacks, Hispanic and other nonwhite immigrants, single women, and alienated white leftists--constituencies that hardly existed or were largely insignificant fifty years ago--now exercise virtual control over our politics and assure the county's ever more leftward course. Therefore, even if the Republicans manage to pull out a victory this time, and in office slow down the country's leftist march somewhat, and in particular stop the imminent catastrophe of Obamacare, all of which I very much hope happens, America in the long run is still lost. Our future is to be a country ruled by a coalition of nonwhite parasites and white leftist scum.


* * *

And will the neoconservatives, mainstream conservatives, and Republican politicians, who cheered and supported the mass Hispanic immigration that made the key difference in assuring America's future as a leftist country, and called critics of this suicidal policy racists, ever admit their responsibility for what has happened? [end of Nov. 2 entry]

I notice that at Lucianne.com this morning (in a thread responding to Charles Krauthammer's amazing yet predictable statement last night on Fox that the future looks bright for the GOP), many commenters are pointing to the changed demographics and the browning of America as the cause of the loss of the country. However, they still identify the problem only as illegal immigration, as though the country had not been browned by the far larger legal immigration. For example, this comment:
Reply 4 - Posted by: Not your typical New Yorker, 11/7/2012 7:07:36 AM
The die is cast, the takers outnumber the earners and with the flood of illegal aliens the browning of America continues to accelerate and they will only want and demand more.
This will not stop any time soon it's the new normal.
The far lefts 50 year plan came to fruition last night.
Now in this presidential term 3 Supreme court justices will reach the age of 80 years old, their replacements will cement the course of this country for many decades to come.
America is lost.



Remarkably, even though the commenter goes so far as to use the racial term, "the browning of America," he still attributes this phenomenon to illegal immigration, thus softening and distracting from the purely racial component of the word "browning." Mainstream conservatives remain incapable of criticizing the mass legal Third-World immigration that we have been receiving since 1965, because then they would be saying outright, without any cavils or qualifications, that the race of the immigrants is itself the problem, not their illegality.