Race

Obama Suspends the End of Racism

by Bill O'Connell on July 2, 2010

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His election was a major milestone in the history of the United States. Leaving aside his political philosophy which a number of us opposed and more are seeing that philosophy more clearly now, electing the first African American to the presidency with 53% of the popular vote no less, truly shows how far our nation has come from the dark days of slavery.

Having achieved this milestone has proved a two edged sword to the progressives and statists. By celebrating the election of Barack Obama it also signaled the defusing of the most potent weapon in their arsenal, the race card. How can you routinely call America a racist country when we just elected an African American President of the United States? By winning with 53% of the popular vote, more than Bill Clinton in two elections and more than Jimmy Carter, it was clear that the black vote alone could not have elected him. It required him winning over many white voters as well. How do you continue to justify Affirmative Action when an African American was chosen by his fellow citizens to the most powerful position on earth? But the progressives and the statists continue to pull the trigger on this dud, particularly where the Tea Party movement is involved, without proof and without shame.

A New Dark Chapter?

Ironically, it is the Obama administration that is practicing a new kind of racism that the mainstream media is conspiring with them to hide.

During the 2008 election, several members of the Black Panthers dressed in paramilitary uniforms and brandishing a nightstick, stood outside of a polling place in Philadelphia intimidating voters by their physical presence and through verbal taunts. The Black Panthers were caught on video tape and as this was a clear violation of the Voting Rights act, charges were filed against them. J. Christian Adams, one of the attorneys at the Department of Justice handling the case called it the “easiest case I’ve ever had.” The facts were clear, the video tape provided irrefutable evidence and the defendants didn’t show up in court to dispute the charges. Because they didn’t show up, the judge issued a default judgment, meaning the Justice Department won the case and only the punishment remained. That is, until the new leadership of the Justice Department weighed in.

This case was originally filed in the last days of the Bush administration. So with the victory in hand, the Justice attorneys handling the case were told to dismiss the charges and drop the case. The reason given was that the “facts and the law don’t support the case.” It was further ordered that these kinds of cases were “not going to happen out of the Civil Rights Division” of the DOJ. In other words, where the plaintiff was white and the defendant was black, the Civil Rights Division of the Department would not pursue the case. If a regional United States Attorney brought a case, the DOJ would permit it to go forward, but not from within the Civil Rights division.

The individuals who delivered this order were Loretta King and Steve Rosenbaum, political appointees. Adams went further to say that Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez of lying under oath to a federal commission about the circumstances surrounding the decision to drop the probe. The Justice Department denied Adams allegation:

“It is not uncommon for attorneys within the department to have good faith disagreements about the appropriate course of action in a particular case, although it is regrettable when a former department attorney distorts the facts and makes baseless allegations to promote his or her agenda,” she said in a written statement.

Mere partisan politics? Sour grapes? You might think that until you hear from Bartle Bull, a lifelong Democrat and Civil Rights attorney who was an eye witness to the incident. Here is an interview with Mr. Bull and Megyn Kelly of Fox News. It is nothing less than stunning. Interview. He describes how one of the Black Panthers said to him and a person with him, “Now you will see what it’s like to be ruled by the black man, cracker.”

The first African American president has people in his administration who will not enforce the Voting Rights Act if the person whose rights are being violated is white. I need not point out that if the Ku Klux Klan was standing in front of the polling place and the Justice Department dropped the case against them what the outrage would be. But with the mainstream media merely the propaganda arm of the administration, this news is only being carried by Fox News and on the Internet.

President Obama and Attorney General Holder must answer to this outrage. They have to tell the American people why they refuse to carry out their sworn duty and enforce the law, particularly when the case was already won and they demanded that the charges be dropped and that no new cases would originate from the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice. A great moment in American history will have a stain upon it unless President Obama immediately reverses course.

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Chris Matthews Cracks

by Bill O'Connell on June 17, 2010

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I guess that getting a tingle running up his leg only lasted so long before he had to give himself another fix. Since talking about all the successes of the current administration seemed like a hard sell, Mr. Matthews put together a hit piece on the Tea Parties and the right, or as he calls it, the “New Right.”

On his Hardball program, Matthews “documentary” was titled “The Rise of the New Right.” In it he tries to paint the Tea Party movement as a fringe group of racists, gun nuts, and generally a group waiting for a reason to break into violence.

You would be hard pressed to find a more over the top cheerleader for Barack Obama than Chris Matthews. Matthews took advantage of his position in the media to actively work to get Obama elected, and now he is crestfallen that General Electric, CBS, and Disney/ABC do not control the news like in the good old days. He openly attacks Fox News and blames the Internet for allowing the Tea Party to do an end run around the main stream media and get their information out. Matthews, like big government, is smarter than you. He knows what “news” you need to hear, and will diligently work to keep what you don’t need to know from reaching your eyes and ears.

The Tea Party that I know has some very basic principles:

Fiscal responsibility
Accountability
Transparency
Free market solutions

Pretty radical stuff, eh? In a Rasmussen poll taken earlier this month, 46% of voters say the Tea Party is good for America, while 31% disagree. Matthews doesn’t tell you this and he makes sure his “documentary” doesn’t provide the information that would let you draw that conclusion.

He reports on the militia movement and specifically mentions the Hutaree militia that plotted to kill a policeman and then those who would attend his funeral. While constantly tying the Tea Party, and the militia to the Republicans he doesn’t mention that the one person in the Hutaree militia whose political affiliation is known was a Democrat and he voted as such. Not that there is any linkage between what party one belongs to and being a nut-case, but a fair reporter might mention that to give an honest representation of the story.

Matthews also makes several references to violence against Democrats after the health care vote. He neglects to say that only one case of violence resulted in an arrest. That was for an attack against Republican Eric Cantor’s office. Any one can get a brick and write a note on it quoting one of the Founding Fathers, but until to catch who did it and find out who they really are, you don’t know if it is an extremist on the right, or a Saul Alinsky disciple on the left who wants to discredit the Tea Party people.

Matthews liberally, no pun intended, sprinkles through his story extremists on the right, going back to the 1930s, such as Father Coughlin, but nowhere does he mention extremists on the left. There is no profile of Louis Farrakhan, Reverend Wright, the Democrats who fought against the Civil Rights Act, while a majority of Republicans supported it. There is no mention of our government internment of thousands of American citizens of Japanese descent during World War II.

It’s getting closer to the mid-term elections and Matthews doesn’t like seeing everything he has bet his reputation on going down in flames. So he takes out this “hail Mary” pass to try to turn the tide against the Tea Party and scare people into staying safe with the Democrats. But this time, the main stream media is not in control. They can’t craft the message and force feed it to the American public. Broadcast news and many major newspapers are losing viewers and readership daily, because Toto has pulled the curtain back on the Great and Powerful Oz that was the main stream media and exposed it for what it is, a shill for the Progressive left.

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Tell Me Again Who The Violent Extremists Are?

by Bill O'Connell on April 7, 2010

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Right after the Nancy Pelosi “in your face” parade to the capital to cram ObamaCare into law, the lame stream media filled the airwaves with “news” of those Tea Party Extremists. They were spitting on a black Congressmen, shouting the “N” word and other ugly things. In listening to those news stories I pondered the possibility that it was all a page right out of Saul Alinsky’s “Rules for Radicals”. Make false accusations and let the slobbering media do the heavy lifting. Well perhaps it’s time to re-visit the scene of the crime.

The Unsubstantiated Claims

Spitting on a black Congressman — video footage shows a man cupping his hands around his mouth to channel the sound energy as he bellowed his opposition to Pelosi and crew. A black Congressman walking near by learned the true meaning of “say it, don’t spray it.” Upon being struck with the vocal protesters spittle, the Congressman said something to him, but the man continued to shout his protests. There was no clear evidence of someone spitting, in the true sense of the word, on the Congressman. Perhaps you can call it collateral damage.
Shouting the “N” word — another individual claimed that the “N” word was shouted at him “at least fifteen times.” Hundreds of protestors, dozens of cameras, cell phones, police, news media, and no one can produce any evidence to back up this man’s claim. Esteemed civil rights hero John Lewis was asked to come on several news programs to talk about this but he declined.
Threats against Congressmen — reports of voice mail threats, faxes of nooses, bricks through windows, all no doubt happened, but no perpetrator has been caught. Without out a suspect, this could just as easily been done by a left wing supporter to discredit the right as someone on the right. Until such time as an individual is questioned there is no way to tie this to any Tea Party affiliation.

The Stubborn Facts

Here are some developing news items that you won’t hear reported in the lame stream media.

There was one arrest regarding a death threat of a Congressman. That was for a threat against Republican Congressman Eric Cantor.
The ugly business about protesters at the funeral of Marine Lance Corporal Matthew Snyder who died in Iraq. Members of the Westboro Baptist Church gleefully cheered the death of the brave Marine, saying it was God’s will. The leader of this movement, Fred Phelps, calls America a “sodomite nation of flag worshiping idolaters.” He believes all homosexuals should be persecuted. He has also run for public office five times…as a Democrat.
When the Hutaree Militia were arrested while plotting to assassinate a police officer and then kill those who attended his funeral, the lame stream media immediately referred to them as a “Christian” militia and ominously tried to link them to those on the right. The political affiliation of one of the militia members, Jacob J. Ward has recently been uncovered. He is a registered Democrat.

Let History Be Your Guide

Having attended several Tea Party gatherings, I can report that they were orderly, law abiding, polite and enthusiastic. Did some expressions of frustration and outrage go a little too far? Perhaps, but it was rare and limited to what was written on signs.

However on the left we have real unrepentant bomb throwers (Obama pal Bill Ayers), we have smashing windows in Seattle, and at WTO meetings, we have tables being overturned and thrown at an Ann Coulter speaking engagement in Ottawa. When the police show up for a left wing demonstration they typically arrive in riot gear. At a Tea Party people come up to the mounted police and ask if they can pet the horse. So when things get ugly, who do you think is really behind the nasty business?

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Alinsky Threatens Democrats

by Bill O'Connell on March 25, 2010

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“What follows is for those who want to change the world from what it is to what they believe it should be. The Prince was written by Machiavelli for the Haves on how to hold power. Rules for Radicals is written for the Have-Nots on how to take it away.”

So reads the opening paragraph of Saul Alinsky’s book, “Rules for Radicals.” Barack Obama is a follower of Saul Alinsky taking his first job out of Columbia as a community organizer in Chicago and tutored by a man named Mike Kruglik. Kruglig described Obama this way:

“He was a natural, the undisputed master of agitation, who could engage a room full of recruiting targets in a rapid-fire Socratic dialogue, nudging them to admit that they were not living up to their own standards. As with the panhandler, he could be aggressive and confrontational. With probing, sometimes personal questions, he would pinpoint the source of pain in their lives, tearing down their egos just enough before dangling a carrot of hope that they could make things better.” — “Obama’s Alinsky Jujitsu,” American Thinker, January 8, 2008

Democrats Facing Threats After Passage of Health Care Reform

While wading through a crowd of protesters carrying a massive gavel, Nancy Pelosi was joined by several prominent black Democrats. A racial epithet was called out from the crowd evoking a reaction from Pelosi’s companions. The cameras caught the reaction, but not the provocateur. Neither the police or any news organization caught the individual, but the “main stream media” immediately started linking Tea Party protesters with racism.

In the following days, CNN and others reported threats to Democrats who voted for the health care bill, including a graphic voicemail to Bart Stupak; an anonymous fax picturing a noose was sent to a black Democratic Congressman James Clyburn; Democratic Congresswoman Louise Slaughter reports a brick being thrown through the window of her district office in Niagara Falls, NY. Very troubling indeed.

Having walked down Pennsylvania Avenue with thousands of Tea Party protesters last year, I can say they were the most orderly, principled, polite, helpful gathering of people you could imagine. Naturally the “main stream media” reported nothing of this demonstration other than a sign or two that linked this administration to the Nazis. So was I surprised to see this vitriol suddenly sprout up? While I could understand the frustration with this arrogant Congress and President ignore the overwhelming will of the people, I still couldn’t grasp them going that far.

When I heard about the broken window in Congresswoman Slaughter’s district office, I thought of other protests with broken glass. Protesters smashing windows in Seattle at a meeting of the World Trade Organization in 1999. The G20 summit in Scotland in 2009 had protesters smashing windows. These violent protesters represent the left, not the right. Hmmm…

Last night in Ottawa, the police cancelled a speech by Ann Coulter at the University of Ottawa, because the threat of violence became too great:

After Tuesday night, the hatred incited by Francois’ letter is no longer theoretical. The police called off my speech when the auditorium was surrounded by thousands of rioting liberals—screaming, blocking the entrance, throwing tables, demanding that my books be burned, and finally setting off the fire alarm.

Ms. Coulter received a letter, before her speech, from the provost of the University that she could potentially be criminally liable for hate speech in Canada. Who else spoke at the University without such admonishment? How about Communist Angela Davis? Hmmm…

Rules for Radicals

So what are Saul Alinsky’s instructions to radicals? Here he outlines the purpose:

In this book we are concerned with how to create mass organizations to seize power and give it to the people; to realize the democratic dream of equality, justice, peace…. “Better to die on your feet than to live on your knees.’ This means revolution.” p.3

“Radicals must be resilient, adaptable to shifting political circumstances, and sensitive enough to the process of action and reaction to avoid being trapped by their own tactics and forced to travel a road not of their choosing.” p.6

“A Marxist begins with his prime truth that all evils are caused by the exploitation of the proletariat by the capitalists. From this he logically proceeds to the revolution to end capitalism, then into the third stage of reorganization into a new social order of the dictatorship of the proletariat, and finally the last stage — the political paradise of communism.” p.10

“An organizer working in and for an open society is in an ideological dilemma to begin with, he does not have a fixed truth — truth to him is relative and changing; everything to him is relative and changing…. To the extent that he is free from the shackles of dogma, he can respond to the realities of the widely different situations….”

Everything is relative and changing. Doesn’t that sound like the left’s view of a “living and breathing” Constitution? The Constitution is not what the Founding Fathers intended when the wrote it, but what the words mean in today’s context. In other words, there really is no Constitution, because the Constitution means whatever you say it means today.

“The tenth rule… is you do what you can with what you have and clothe it with moral garments.… It involves sifting the multiple factors which combine in creating the circumstances at any given time… Who, and how many will support the action?… If weapons are needed, then are appropriated weapons available? Availability of means determines whether you will be underground or above ground; whether you will move quickly or slowly…” p.36

Clothe it with moral garments. Did the Democrats argue the merits of health care or did they continually fall back to stories of, for example, “a woman who had to wear her dead sister’s dentures,” said Louise Slaughter. Or, they said that when people were asked about the details of ObamaCare, the public overwhelmingly supported it, so they are not opposed to the whole package. Really? I’m sure that if you picked through the programs of Hitler, Stalin, Castro, and Mao you could get similar reactions: lower unemployment, self-respect, prosperity, etc., but the full package doesn’t work, it’s a lie.

Rules for Radicals: Tactics

9. “The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself.”

Can you say racism? How many times has this trump card been played? The epithet hurled from the crowd immediately sparked cries of racism and the “main stream media” tied them to the Tea Party protesters.

13. Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it. In conflict tactics there are certain rules that [should be regarded] as universalities. One is that the opposition must be singled out as the target and ‘frozen.’…

The Democrats squeaked through an ugly health care bill. The next hurdle is to get this far behind them and try to salvage the 2010 election before they are thrown from office. Recent polls show a significant uptick in Obama’s approval, but it is all coming from Democrats. Republicans haven’t budget and Independents are even worse. Hmmm… what do Democrats do now? Read Rule 13.

Pick the target: The Tea Party protesters are the most energized potent force in politics today. They must be stopped. Freeze it: Have some left wing radicals, maybe some SEIU members mingle among the Tea Party protesters and shout the racial epithets and melt away. Pelosi’s parade route was known among the Democrats. They staged it to look like a Civil Rights march from the 1960s. They knew the media would be there and they could see, once on site, where to stand to be heard by Pelosi & co., but not be caught on camera. The lap dog media would immediately launch into grave concerns of the Tea Party turning ugly, “as we knew they would.” Freeze them.

Personalize it. What is more personal than racism? How do you defend against a charge of racism? Polarize it: Paint the Tea Party as a bunch of hateful, racist, violent rednecks with guns and fair minded people will not want to associate with them. They will drift away from the Tea Party and in the absence of another group to organize them, they hope these folks will become dejected and not turn out in November, and Nancy Pelosi can dodge a bullet and tighten her grip on the Speaker’s gavel.

Battle Back

The executive branch is responsible for enforcing the laws. Press them to find out who did these things. Put forth the theory that it is the left trying to discredit the Tea Party people. After all, which is the more plausible explanation, radicals being radicals or law abiding citizens becoming crazed and dangerous? Make them disprove the case.

This appears more dangerous and grave every day. It’s eight months to November. Stay vigilant and don’t let up.

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Trapped by His Own Gift

by Bill O'Connell on January 3, 2010

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Daniel Henninger wrote in the Wall Street Journal:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid tells of congratulating freshman Sen. Obama on a phenomenal speech. Without a hint of conceit, Mr. Obama replied, “Harry, I have a gift.”

In the article he also describes this observation:

Harvard Law Prof. Charles Ogletree told how Mr. Obama spoke on one contentious issue at the law school, and each side thought he was endorsing their view. Mr. Ogletree said: “Everyone was nodding, Oh, he agrees with me.”

That’s essentially how he got elected. With a heaping helping hand from the popular media, many people saw Obama as a blank screen upon which they could project their own views and see those as Obama’s own. He’s our man! He listens. He cares deeply. For a politician it is a phenomenal gift. For a legislator it is an extremely valuable gift. For an executive it is poison.

Pulling the Trigger

As a politician or a legislator you are in the role of persuader; somebody else makes the decision to vote for you or vote with you, respectively. As an executive you are in the role of the decider. You must make a decision and every decision, especially the tough ones are going to make a good many people unhappy. Perhaps that explains why, in the Illinois Senate, Obama voted “Present” so many times. Voting “Present” rather than “Yea” or “Nay” allowed him to hold that special place where everyone felt he agreed with them. Too many decisions one way or another would have tarnished “the gift”. So why is “the gift” poison for an executive? If you don’t have “the gift” and you make a decision your opponents may disagree with you, but they are not surprised. If you have “the gift” and you make a decision, those on the short side feel betrayed and angry, because they thought you agreed with them and then “sold out” and decided the other way.

Obama is in a tight spot where he has to make decisions and decisions have consequences. When you make a decision it is very hard to make it seem like everyone got their way. His complete lack of executive experience is telling. If he had some executive experience, such as a mayor or a governor, he might have had enough practice learning how to make his decisions appear to satisfy everyone, as his campaign speeches did. But that’s the thing about decisions. If everyone supports them, they’re not much of a decision, like deciding to pardon a turkey on Thanksgiving. Everyone enjoys the decision, but it’s really not what we elect presidents for.

I’ll Have the Waffles, Please

If you watch closely, you can see that Obama is struggling to preserve “the gift”. He said he is for closing Guantanamo, but not yet. He is for pulling out of Iraq, but no timetable. The general he put in charge of Afghanistan, McChrystal, said he needed 40,000 more troops, but Obama could not bring himself to say yes or no. He had to ponder, think, consult, weigh alternatives, and three months later, he gave McChrystal what he asked for. Those on the left complained that he was not pulling out. Those on the right complained that he wasted precious time while our troops were on the battlefield. His backers tried to give him the fig leaf of showing gravitas. He can’t seem to find the magic formula where everyone applauds him. From “the gift” he has gone to “the anti-gift”. Instead of satisfying everyone, he is finding that he is satisfying no one.

Move On

It’s time for Obama to “Move On”. He should put “the gift” in his trophy case right next to his Nobel Peace Prize. It got him to the White House. How much more can he ask of such a thing? So drop the pretense. We all know he is a hard left guy, so he should just be who he is. He may suddenly face a more hostile press, or they may love him more, although that would be hard to believe. But when he makes a decision he will at least please his base, and then his opponents can fight his statist goals without being branded as racists. As a hard left guy he will probably not get re-elected because America is not a hard left country, on the contrary the majority of Americans describe themselves as conservative. But by choosing he can try to do what he can within one term. It will be a battle. Obama’s poll ratings have dropped steadily since his inauguration and the Democrats are likely to lose seats in Congress this fall. As an old acquaintance once said to me, “It’s like standing in the middle of the road. Choose left or choose right, but choose; otherwise you get hit by traffic coming in both directions.”

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Nobel Nitwits

by Bill O'Connell on December 10, 2009

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Today Barack Obama received his Nobel Peace Prize in Norway for his accomplishments in the area of …..? Well, nothing actually. It was called anticipatory, in other words, he got the prize for what they hoped he would accomplish. There’s that hope thing again. I hope he stops burying this country in debt.

TR and Woodrow Wilson

In some puzzling way, President Obama’s acolytes like to make comparisons to two other presidents who won the Nobel Peace prize. But they actually accomplished something or introduced a concept that eventually prevailed. In 1905, Teddy Roosevelt successfully negotiated the end of the Russo-Japanese War, and that peace actually stuck. Woodrow Wilson created the League of Nations which, although it failed survive, it was the forerunner of the United Nations. Gentlemen, take a bow. As for President Obama, I guess we’ll have to keep holding our breath and hoping.

Damaged Goods

However noble, the Nobel Peace Prize might have been, it has been reduced to a sad joke. Let’s look at some past recipients:

2007 – Al Gore and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Al Gore won the Peace prize for his deeply flawed documentary, which by the way two members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences have called for him to return the Oscars he won for the same film. He didn’t win the Nobel Prize in Physics or Chemistry. Meanwhile the IPCC is embroiled in the midst of Climategate. Who lost out to these two? A woman who smuggled approximately 2,500 Jews, mostly small children, out of the Warsaw ghetto before the Nazi’s could exterminate them.
2005 – Mohamed El Baradei and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) “for their efforts to prevent nuclear energy from being used for military purposes and to ensure that nuclear energy for peaceful purposes is used in the safest possible way” . While investigating Iran El Baradei “opposed the publication of a secret report generated by his own agency, one which indicated Iran was using its civilian program as a cover to make weapons. And why did he oppose publication?” {more} Do you feel blissfully peaceful now when you ponder Iran?
2002 – Jimmy Carter – “for his decades of untiring effort to find peaceful solutions to international conflicts, to advance democracy and human rights, and to promote economic and social development”. Well he must have gotten tired as he mused about how any opposition to President Obama’s policies being racially motivated for the most part.
2001 – The United Nations and Kofi Annan – for their work for a better organized and more peaceful world. It seems they wanted to wait until the UN was nearly irrelevant in world affairs and Kofi Annan’s son was ripping off the UN’s Oil for Food program. Hmmm, that must have come from the “better organized” part.
1994 – Yassir Arafat, Shimon Peres, and Yitzhak Rabin – for their efforts to create peace in the Middle East. How’s that working out?

Notably Absent

So where are the Nobel Peace prizes for Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush, for ending the Cold War without firing a shot? That wasn’t just peaceful that was miraculous. But then again, they were conservatives and therefore they don’t qualify for the Nobel Peace Prize.

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Good Government, Bad Government

by Bill O'Connell on November 18, 2009

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If I asked you a simple question, what government organization works well, what would you say? Let’s take a look at two government organizations and compare their effectiveness and motivation.

The Military

Whether you support our troops on the battlefield or want them to always stay home in their barracks, most Americans will say the military does a pretty good job. Why? That is, why are they effective, not just why do people think so? Well, they put a lot of investment in training and technology. They seem to have solved the problem of integration, being based on merit rather than racial prejudice. These are all important things, but I don’ t they get to the core of the issue. The key question is, what happens if they don’t do their job? They die…they die, the guy beside them dies, their buddies die, and depending on the size of the conflict, their families and country may eventually die. With that kind of motivation, race is not even secondary. If the guy next to me has got my back and I have his, I don’t care what color he or she is. We do it right, we live; we don’t, we die.

The K-12 Teacher

K-12 education comes under fire in this country, and rightly so, for failing to produce an educated workforce. In New York, for example we spend over $14,000 per student, per year on education, far above the national average of around $9,000. Are students in New York 50% smarter than the country in general? Hardly. Is the nation as a whole turning out well educated students? Sadly, no.

Our K-12 public schools are a government run monopoly. So what happens to a K-12 teacher if they fail to do their job? If they have been in the job long enough to get tenure, nothing. They will get a raise like everyone else. So what motivates them to turn out outstanding students? I’ll wait.

Let me be clear that I don’t want to lump all teachers together. They are many teachers who, by having what I suppose is a strong moral streak, do a great job because they want to teach. Okay, so let’s look at the teaching profession where there is a group that does their best because they get satisfaction from doing a good job. Now, some studies come out that say the way to improve results is smaller classroom size. The teachers’ unions get behind it and eventually push it through. So what does that mean? If you cut the size of the class in half, you double the number of classes. If you double the number of classes, you have to double the number of teachers and thus have to go deeper into the labor pool to find them. Before you took this step, we can probably assume that all the self-motivated teachers were already on the job. So the additional teachers are motivated by what?

Co -conspirators

That brings us back to the teachers’ unions. When government’s come under pressure to cut educational expenses, the airwaves are soon flooded with the heart wrenching commercials pleading to restore the funding “for the children’s sake.” What you don’t hear is the trailer that says, “This commercial paid for by the PTA,” or “This commercial paid for by the Association of Concerned Parents.” No, what you typically hear is, “This commercial paid for by the X Teacher’s union, Joe Blow, President.”

Who do the unions really represent…really? The students? or the teachers? They want the funds restored so that their membership is not hurt and their dues are not curtailed. If their true concern was for the students, why not support school vouchers and charter schools? They fight the former with a vengeance and the latter, if it is not union organized.

Let’s Not Pick on K-12 Education

Let’s look at other government areas. Government is the only area where union membership is growing. How many people relish going to their Department of Motor Vehicles? How efficient is the Post Office? Amtrak? Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have a bonus compensation plan, which is a step in the right direction unless it leads to cooking the books and making extremely risky loans that lead to the near collapse of our economy. How can we get this under control?

Controlling the Uncontrollable

Our government is trying to install a massive health care program that will cost a trillion dollars. At the same time, tens of billions of dollars are stolen from Medicare every year and they can’t stop it. Early this year, the Obama Administration passed a $787 billion stimulus package, spent $18 million to build a website to track it, and put Joe Biden in the role of watch dog. How is that working out? A recent report from ABC News, of all places, found that credit for creating jobs was given on the web site to Congressional Districts that do not exist. A $1,000 grant was purported to have created 50 jobs. The New York Times investigated and found that the $1,000 went to purchase a lawn mower. It took from the time of the founding of the Republic until about the mid 1990s to accumulate $6 trillion in debt. It has doubled since then, and it is projected to go from $12 trillion to $14 trillion by next year!

It cannot be controlled. It is impossible to control. The only solution is to cut the federal government down to size. Take out the Constitution and read what the true functions of government are supposed to be. The military, absolutely; the Post Office, yes it’s in there; coin money; establish patents and copyrights; establish the courts; control the District of Columbia; regulate interstate commerce; make treaties; give the State of the Union address. That pretty much sums it up and everything else should be left to the states and local government or the people.

We should jettison all the rest and cut this government down to size and get out of debt. Department of Labor–gone; Department of Health and Human Services–gone; Department ment of Housing and Urban Development–gone; Department of Transportation–gone; Department of Energy–gone; Depatrment of Education–gone; Department of Veterans Affairs–gone, rolled into the Department of Defense; Department of Homeland Security–gone, rolled into the Department of Defense; Department of the Interior–gone; Department of Agriculture–gone.

The amount of money saved would be enormous. Selling all the real estate and buildings would bring in more money. We could then cut taxes to jump start the economy and run a surplus to cut the debt. The next step would be to make it illegal for unions to organize government workers without a referendum approved by all the voters. Side benefits would be less campaign money because there would be less government to influence. Government would be more accountable to the people because it would be closer to the people, that is, at the state level or local level. We can do this proactively, or wait until the government is bankrupt and we have to sell off the parts to the Chinese.

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Barack Obama — Illusionist

by Bill O'Connell on November 14, 2009

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Over the past eleven months, have you ever gotten a feeling that you are watching a magician, rather than a president run our country? As any practitioner of the art of the illusionist will tell you, one of the key things is to keep the audience distracted. Have them watch the left hand, while the right is slipping the coin into the pocket. The Obama Administration is about to unleash their greatest trick yet, trying Khalid Sheik Mohammed in civil court in New York for the 9/11 attack on America. Why?

The Greatest Show On Earth

The trial will become an absolute three ring circus, with all the world watching closely. The liberal pundits say, “this is our chance to show the world our justice system. We can demonstrate how civilized we are, and show the Muslim world how fair we are.” Really?

Remember to the footage in the Muslim world immediately following the collapse of the World Trade Center towers. They were dancing in the street, laughing and singing, shouting praise to Allah. What do you think the reaction will be if Khalid Sheik Mohammed, jumps up in court and screams out, “Kill the infidels! This is a fraud meant to disguise these devil’s tricks!” Do we let him ramble with a global audience? Do we have the bailiffs wrestle him to the ground? Do we put him in restraints for the rest of the trial? Who exactly is going to show the world what?

We Have No Secrets

In a civilian trial there is a process called discovery, where the defense is told everything the prosecution plans on bringing to court, including witnesses, so that the defense has a chance to prepare their rebuttal case. How much of the CIA’s methods and contacts are we prepared to reveal to the world and to Khalid Sheik Mohammed’s allies? Or, how much are we not going to use in order to protect that information and at the same time increase the chances that he will be acquitted?

Can Anybody Say O.J.?

Do you remember the O.J. Simpson trial? A slam-dunk if ever there was one. There was blood evidence, DNA evidence, means, motive, opportunity, it couldn’t get any easier. But what happened? Judge Lance Ito, lost control of his court room in the klieg lights of national television. One of O.J.’s attorneys or advisors told O.J. to stop taking his arthritis medication so his hands would swell and then the famous glove trick, abra cadabra, “If the glove doesn’t fit, you must acquit.” What happened after that trial? Dancing in the streets of the black community.

The Jury Pool

Are Muslims going to be excluded from the jury pool? If so, on what grounds and would a judge allow it? In the O.J. case we had what was called jury nullification, where a jury handed up a verdict not based on the evidence presented, but based on a social determination. O.J. was a symbol for all black men put on trial and all past injustices. He was a sports hero to millions and he wasn’t going down, no matter what. What if a someone with strong beliefs sees disrupting the outcome of the trial as the new jihad? Don’t use suicide bombers in New York, that’s so Middle East, let’s kill them softly by getting Khalid Sheik Mohammed acquitted or a give them a hung jury. What better way to humiliate the Great Satan. It will be like David and Goliath all over again.

The Real Trial

Or is it really the Bush Administration that Obama wants to put on trial? The Obama administration’s popularity is sinking link a stone. The stimulus package was a bust. Cap and Trade is a disaster. Health care a debacle. Tea Party’s are breaking out all over. The Democrats got trounced in Virginia and New Jersey, and even New York’s 23rd is still alive as recounts have dramatically closed the gap. A show trial of the Bush Administration is just what the Obama Administration needs to keep the focus off what they are really doing.

This is a tragedy and a travesty and there should be no end to the shame heaped upon this administration if they follow through on this.

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The Multicultural Fifth Column

by Bill O'Connell on November 10, 2009

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There was a time when people came to our shores to find a better life. To escape persecution and poverty and to build a better life for their children was their goal. They found Lady Liberty lifting her lamp beside the golden door.

What happened next was that people assimilated. Their children went to school with other children and learned to read and speak English. Their names may have sounded different but before long their voices didn’t. Sure, New Englanders sounded different than those from Mississippi, but they sounded very much like their neighbors. They became Americans.

I just finished reading Newt Gingrich and William Forstchen’s historical novel, To Try Men’s Souls, which is the story of the George Washington crossing the Delaware on Christmas night, 1776, and attacking Trenton. Trenton was guarded by Hessian mercenaries, who were some of the most elite soldiers in Europe. It was a mismatch beyond belief, but in a last ditch effort, their password that night was “Victory or Death,” and with the element of surprise, they prevailed. In one passage it mentioned American soldiers of Dutch and German extraction shouting to the Hessians to surrender, in German. They were probably closer to the Hessians in culture and blood than to their fellow Americans from Boston, but they considered themselves Americans and were willing to die for their country.

The Balkanization of America

Today, we are mired in multiculturalism. I remember the story of an Hispanic man loudly protesting to his local school board regarding bilingual education to which he was opposed. “You’re teaching my son to be a janitor!” he said, “I want him to learn in English, so that he can get a job with a future!”

We should not lose track of our roots. It is right to celebrate where we came from. One of the great things about New York is the different neighborhoods and parades that teach and celebrate about where we came from, which is good. But if carried to the point where we no longer assimilate; where we remain pockets of groups with their own identity and politics, we are in grave danger of ceasing to be America.

During World War II, what if people of German heritage refused to fight against Hitler or for that matter felt a greater allegiance to him than to America? Some did. They were tried for treason. What if they were protected instead? What if their differences were looked at with admiration rather than suspicion?

Fort Hood

Commentators in the news are twisting themselves in knots trying to disassociate Major Nidal Hasan’s slaughter of 13 Americans from his jihadist proclivities, despite evidence of outright hostility toward America and contact with a radical imam. It is politically incorrect, to speak of his religion. The Army Chief of Staff raises concern about negatively impacting the military’s record of diversity, if we focus on anything but a lone gunman who snapped.

But what if there is a larger plot? What if there is an effort on the behalf of some Muslims to purposely not assimilate, to infiltrate the military and become a fifth column within? Multiculturalism makes it far easier for this to occur because if everyone looks different, no one stands out. On the other hand, if everyone assimilates, those who speak, act, or plot against America become more obvious. Again, imagine multiculturalism in the United States in 1943. You might have whole communities that were German to the core, did not like non-Germans among them and quickly spread the alarm when a stranger approached. How much easier would it have been for Hitler to build a network of saboteurs?

Kill Multiculturalism Before it Kills Us

We must reinvigorate the idea of assimilation. Speak any language you want at home; dress any way you want; practice your faith as you please, but where government is involved, we should be treated equally. We should speak one common language for all official business. If not, where do we draw the line?

In Minnesota in 2007 a public university coffee cart was banned from playing Christmas Carols, but public money was being used to install foot baths to accommodate Muslims before prayer. After the terrorist attacks on 9/11 and now another terrorist attack at Fort Hood, we have to be able to tell the good Muslims from those out to kill us. We must have true peace loving Muslims, become true Americans. We have to engender that we are Americans first, like those early Americans of Dutch and German decent, and not have divided loyalties particularly where the “other loyalty” insists on killing us infidels.

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Gates and Crowley, Who’s the Real Profiler?

by Bill O'Connell on July 30, 2009

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What is racial profiling? I think most people would agree it is where an individual is observed and because of his or her race, some assumptions are made about their behavior. Let’s examine the Louis Gates case

Sergeant Crowley

Sergeant Crowley responded to a call of a possible Breaking and Entering. This was the result of a call to 911 reporting that a passerby and a neighbor saw two men, no race mentioned, attempting to force their way into a house. Crowley, who is white, and two other officers, one black and one Hispanic, responded to the call. Crowley began to investigate and Gates responded belligerently and called Crowley a racist. The altercation moved outside where a crowd began to form. Crowley warned Gates several times that he was becoming disorderly and even showed his handcuffs to make his point. The 911 caller said there was only one person shouting and it was Gates. Crowley is a highly regarded officer who trains other officers regarding racial profiling.

Dr. Gates

Dr. Gates is a well respected professor at Harvard University and had just returned from a long trip and found he was locked out of his house. To be fair, he was probably tired and irritated and having to deal with the issue of being locked out. He and another individual tried to force their way into the house. The witnesses, not knowing it was Gates and concerned about other reported burglaries in the neighborhood called 911. The police arrived, Gates saw that Crowley was white and assumed that Crowley’s being there was racially motivated and proceeded to call him a racist, insult Crowley’s mother, and take the dispute outside the house. So who exactly profiled whom?

Obama

Barack Obama, who was supposed to be the post-racial president really stepped in it, when he said the Cambridge Police acted “stupidly.” Perhaps there is a silver lining. By raising this local issue to national prominence, perhaps we can finally put to rest the battle of racial animosity. Let’s face it, there will always be prejudice. We are wired to be prejudiced. Our survival depends on being able to size someone up quickly as friend or foe and take the appropriate action. It is a natural instinct. However, unlike animals, we have the ability to reason and control our instincts.

This self control has been driven into whites for 40 years. You are guilty. You are racist. You must be re-educated. You’ve got to control yourselves. Has it worked? Well in a country that is still predominantly white, we elected a black man president with 53% of the popular vote. That’s more than Bill Clinton ever got by a long shot. It’s more than either Bush got and for a Democrat you have to go back to Lyndon Johnson in 1964 to find better poll numbers.

On the other hand, minorities have been told for the same period of time, you can’t be a racist, no matter what you say, because you don’t have power (that’s over, with Obama in the White House). It’s not your fault; you are a victim of society. You didn’t get the job because of racism, so let’s throw out the test. There is so much prejudice in this country you can’t get into college unless we put a box on the form to indicate your race and give you a helping hand. It’s not your faul; it’s not your fault. With all that conditioning who could be blamed for throwing the race card whenever there is a bad outcome and the other guy is white? It’s a conditioned reflex.

Playing the Race Card

I taught a graduate course in telecommunications. There was a student, who was black, that I really enjoyed having in my class. He actively participated and really enlivened the discussion. There was one topic that he didn’t seem to grasp and as a result he did poorly on an exam. He asked for a makeup exam, which I granted. My policy was that my makeup exams were notoriously tough. The reason was that the makeup focused on what you got wrong on the first test, and didn’t include a lot of what you got right. If you were going to get another bite at the apple, and you had more time to study and you knew where to focus, I felt that was the only way to be fair to the other students. He did worse on the make-up than on the original test but I took the higher grade of the two. With his other work in the class, he still got a good grade for the course. I later saw him on the elevator and he said to me, “I know why you failed me on those tests. It’s because I’m black.” Everyone took the same test, whites, blacks, Indians, Asians, immigrants, Hispanics, but I was accused of singling him out and failing him because he was black. What I found most interesting was that his body language showed he wasn’t really comfortable using the race card. He said it tentatively, rather than with the outrage some someone truly wronged. It was if someone had coached him to use it. Very sad.

A New Chapter

At the conclusion of today’s beer summit at the White House, they should symbolically take out a card that says RACE in bold letters on it and burn it. This should signal that we are all Americans, and using the race card should be as scorned as racial profiling. Whites have been learning this lesson for forty years; it’s time for everyone else to get the same education. We all have our prejudices. We must not assume that the motive behind every action is racial. Maybe the reason you didn’t get the job is that you weren’t qualified. Maybe the reason you didn’t get into the Ivy League school is that very few people do and your grades were not as good. Maybe the reason you didn’t graduate high school is that you didn’t study. With Barack Obama as President, it’s time to accept that anything is possible in this great country. You have to accept responsibility and work hard. I may not agree with much of what President Obama believes in, but he got to there by working very hard at what worked to get him there. There is no Affirmative Action checkbox in the voting booth.

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