When will our President come to the realization that the government does not have any money save that which is provided by its citizens?  If he understood that, he wouldn’t have said this:

“Just as it would be a terrible mistake to borrow against our children’s future to pay our way today, it would be equally wrong to neglect their future by failing to invest in areas that will determine our economic success in this new century,” Mr. Obama said at the White House.

Let me posit a translation: we shouldn’t borrow against our children’s future, so we should borrow against our children’s future.  And let me add another pet peeve and that is how the statists have redefined the word “invest”.  What they really mean is spend, but invest sounds so much more grown up.  However, most intelligent people understand invest to mean when you put your money into something with the belief you will get all your money back plus a premium.  You don’t invest in the stock market with the idea you will never see your money again and will subsequently put more money into it next year.  You invest in a house with the idea that you will sell it later for more money.  You don’t invest in a house if you expect it to go down in value.  But our elected representatives would have you believe that pouring money down a rat hole is an investment.

Immature and Irresponsible

Like a child caught standing over his mother’s prized china lying shattered on the floor, President Obama wants us to believe it’s not his fault, no, we are going to have trillion dollar plus deficits for the next ten years because of Bush and the Republicans.  He is one year into his presidency.  This is his budget, not Bush’s.  If he can’t handle the job he should resign and turn it over to, er, Biden?  Check that.  Perhaps he can just go watch television in the White House for the next three years and leave the rest of us alone.  Doing nothing would cause less damage than what he has planned.  He jacked up spending 24% and then “courageously” instituted a freeze on that spending for three years.  Think about it.  If I gave you a 24% raise on Monday and then came back on Friday and said, “Gee, I’m really sorry to have to do this, but times are really tough.  I’m going to have to freeze your new salary for the next three years.  Can you ever forgive me?”  Could you not burst out laughing?

We’re Going to Make Some Tough Decisions…Next Year

We are in a fiscal crisis, but don’t think for a moment you are going to see any tough decisions in an election year, particularly when so many Democrats are in danger of having to find jobs in the real world.  So this year is tough talk.  Next year we get busy!

Democrats or Republicans or maybe the Tea Party movement is going to have to act, sooner rather than later.  Here is how the federal government breaks down:

• Medicare and Medicaid — 33%
• Social Security — 21%
• Interest on the Debt — 8%
• Defense — 20%
• Non-Defense Discretionary — 18%

The first three items continue to grow with no signs of slowing and interest will really take off when the Fed stops the easy money program.  Defense can shrink as Iraq and Afghanistan stabilize, but not a lot as this is still job number one for the federal government.  So do you see the problem?  You can thank Democratic President Lyndon Baines Johnson for the first ticking time bomb above.  You can thank Democratic President Franklin Delano Roosevelt for the second ticking time bomb.  You can now thank President Barack Obama for what is becoming the third ticking time bomb and that is without his Health Care, and Cap and Trade.

So how is President Obama going to “solve” this problem?  By tinkering with the last item, Non-Defense Discretionary spending.  But don’t worry, he will also tax those evil rich and make sure they pay their fair share.  But before he goes too far down that path I have a suggestion for him:

1. Listen closely to the Beatles song “Taxman“
2. Ask yourself why the members of the band moved to the United States?

High tax states like New York and California are finding that a significant number of their wealthy citizenry are moving to lower tax states, exacerbating those states’ fiscal problems.  If you look at the percentage of the population that pays the lion’s share of the taxes you will quickly see that if a relatively small percentage of the population, who can afford to live anywhere, actually decide to leave the United States of Tax the Rich, the resulting fiscal problem will be very, very severe. Obama can only poke his tax stick in that cage so long before he gets a nasty reaction.

We’re All Standing On the Third Rail

Social Security has been called the third rail of politics, but the reality is that we are all standing on the third rail trying to keep our balance and if anyone slips and touches the ground, we’re all fried.  We have to suck up the courage to address Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid.  If we can’t slow the growth of these programs so that they take a smaller amount of the budget pie each year, we are toast.  None of those programs is in the Constitution, but the liberals/progressives created them with empty promises of benefits without costs.  This should have been the first clue:

“Ida May Fuller worked for three years under the Social Security program. The accumulated taxes on her salary during those three years was a total of $24.75. Her initial monthly check was $22.54. During her lifetime she collected a total of $22,888.92 in Social Security benefits.”

Ida May Fuller was the first recipient of monthly S.S. checks when she retired in 1940. She lived to be 100.

She almost got paid back in full with her first check. She got 926 times more than what she paid in. That’s a 92,600% return on “investment.” Not bad, huh?

She got back almost everything she paid in with her first check.  Instead of ringing alarm bells all over the country, politicians patted themselves on the back for the great system they created.  We sent Bernie Madoff to jail, why should Congress be exempt?  What Bernie Madoff did was child’s play in comparison.  Where he fell short was that he couldn’t force people to participate through payroll taxes, and he couldn’t print money.  So why is what he did criminal and what Congress is doing not?  He had to get his participants to voluntarily turn over their money.  He promised returns of 40% per year.  Ida may got 92,600% return on her investment.

Burn the Ships

There is the story of a general who landed on a beach to face an formidable enemy.  He ordered that the ships that brought them there be burned.  By doing so, he knew his men would fight ferociously because there was no escape, either they fought to win or they died.  Perhaps we should do the same with Congress and President Obama.  Fix Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid or you join Bernie Madoff in Cell Block “C”, for running a massive Ponzi scheme.  What has kept Congress from fixing this in the past is the fear of not getting reelected.  Let’s raise the stakes so that not getting reelected would pale in comparison to incarceration.  It’s time our elected officials started paying attention to the people and not their perks.  The disaster train is going downhill and picking up speed, headed for a cliff.  It’s time ALL politicians put the country first and fixed this problem that, after all, they created.  It’s fun to give out the goodies, but this is a crisis that cannot be shunned.  It must be dealt with head on.

For nearly eight years we heard the left scream, “Bush Lied!” over the decision to invade Iraq.  One decision and the same refrain repeated over and over again.  Where is the scrutiny of the truth police where President Obama is concerned?

In his State of the Union address he took the unprecedented step of calling out the Supreme Court and encouraging his minions to give that rebuke a standing ovation.  Shameful.  This is not to say that Obama cannot criticize other branches of government, but there is a time and a place.  When Joe Wilson called out “LIAR!” during a previous speech by President Obama he was roundly criticized and rightly so.  Not for the criticism, but for the time and the place.  Joe Wilson called the president to apologize.  Did Obama do the same?

The timing of the act was bad enough, but the accusation he made was not true, as Samuel Alito could be seen saying, if you can read lips.  In the midst of his constitutional duty to report to Congress on the State of the Union, he uses a blatant lie to attack his guests. But that wasn’t all.  His speech was sprinkled throughout with falsehoods, not least of which was his statement on jobs.

Counting the Uncountable

To try to put a positive spin on his porkulus bill, he had to make up a statistic that no reputable economist can endorse, “jobs saved”.  In his State of the Union speech and on the Sunday morning talk show circuit, Obama and his team talked about 2 million jobs created or saved. But they weren’t all on the same page, some said 1.8 million, but regardless it is blatant dishonesty.

Jobs created is a real statistic.  As a small business owner I can tell you that when you hire someone there are a number of government agencies that you have to report it to and you have a deadline in which to do so.  There is also some paperwork involved when you eliminate a job.  But I have never, never had to report to any agency when I thought about eliminating a job and then changed my mind.  After all wouldn’t that be the definition of a job saved?

If I never thought about eliminating the position, then the job is not “saved” it just continues to exist.  If I thought about eliminating the position and did so, it would not be a job “saved” it would be a job eliminated, no?  So it is this two step process of thinking about the action and then not following through that could reasonably be thought of as a “job saved”.  How do you measure that thought process?  Hiring someone is an observable action.  Eliminating a job is an observable action.  Saving a job are two related thought processes not externally observable, they can only be “reported” by the decision maker and it cannot be independently verified.  Is that the kind of statistic upon which you want your government to base billions of dollars in spending decision?   The only added feature of Obamanomics is that some money changes hands.  Money that comes from you, dear taxpayer, and goes to the businessman.  Can you see why such a statistic is ridiculous?

Which One Is It Mr. President?  Mr. Biden? Anyone?

Let’s pretend for a moment that “jobs saved” is a real statistic.  If the president has a figure in his head of 2 million jobs created or saved, and for the aforementioned reasons the number of jobs created is a hard number reported to some agency, then the number of jobs saved should be a matter of simple math.  2 million minus the number of jobs actually created equals the number of jobs saved.  So why not report it as such?  100,000 jobs created and 1.9 million jobs saved, for example.  Why lump them together?  Because when you lump them together its harder to tell how big of a lie the president is telling.

Stimulus recipients previously reported that they had directly “created or saved” 640,329 jobs by Sept. 30, but their filings were criticized after it emerged that some people had reported saving jobs when they had actually spent the money on pay raises or paying employees who were not in danger of being laid off.

In December, the White House Office of Management and Budget changed its guidance, telling recipients they should start counting every worker whose salary was funded with stimulus money, rather than guessing whether the jobs would have existed in the absence of the federal plan. Opponents of the program accused the administration of “moving the goal posts” to make the plan appear more successful. — Wall Street Journal, Latest Stimulus Report Fuels Jobs Pressure, Feb. 1 2010

So companies using stimulus money to give people raises was counted as jobs saved!  We have 10%-17% of our workforce idled and taxpayers are being fleeced to give people raises and this administration is calling that successful policy.  When do we start firing people in this administration?  How about Janet Napolitano?  How about Eric Holder?  or are we saving their jobs too so that the numbers look good?  The other reports are just as galling: $1000 purchase of a lawn mower is credited with saving jobs;  using stimulus money to purchase boots with each boot (left and right) being counted as a job saved because someone had to make the boots; stimulus money going to create jobs in Congressional districts that do not exist.  Does anyone have any confidence that this administration has a clue about how to run a government?  This is beyond embarrassing.

The Next Stimulus

But fear not, since the first stimulus was so successful, President Obama is teeing up the next one, but don’t worry this one is only $100 billion.  Doesn’t that just make you feel warm all over?

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.”

On Tuesday night President Obama gave an uncharacteristically bland speech regarding his way forward in Afghanistan.  In one sentence he said he was adding 30,000 troops while shortly thereafter he said he would be removing them.  It’s enough to make one nostalgic for John Kerry’s “clarification” of how he voted for the war in Iraq before he voted against it.  So our Waffler in Chief has given the enemy their battle plan: hunker down;  keep a low profile;  don’t back me into a corner, and beginning in July 2011, while we’re packing up you can be ramping up.  Bush never committed to an end date certain for that very reason.  They way you defeat the enemy is by making it clear that you will finish the job, no matter how long it takes.

It’s All Karzai’s Fault!

With this administration, it’s always somebody else’s fault.  But put yourself in Karzai’s shoes.  If you have the U.S. on one side, and the Taliban on the other with the U.S. packing up and the Taliban sharpening their knives, who are you going to cut a deal with?  They guy who plans to be there for the next 20 years or the guy who plans to be there for the next 20 months?  There is one way to deal with the bad guys who plan on being there for the next 20 years and that’s to make sure they spend those next 20 years six feet under.

We had similar challenges in Iraq, but once Bush ordered the surge and the bad guys knew we were going to finish the job, they started cutting deals of their own.  Many came over to our side and helped end the violence in a number of provinces.  Peace through strength.  It works.  Weakness fires up the enemy and emboldens him.  You decide which is the better strategy.

Reading one of the liberal pundit’s pan of Sarah Palin’s new book and how the reviewer harps on her inexperience, anyone with a room temperature IQ cannot help but ask, what about the guy who won?  You can say she had little executive experience, only two years as governor of Alaska and two terms as mayor of 7,000 resident Wasilla.  But while one may argue she had little executive experience, he had none.  For that matter, neither did McCain or Biden.  Legislative experience?  Sure.  Executive experience? No, and it shows.

Decisions, Decisions

What has he actually made a decision on?  The economy?  The porkulus package that is “saving” so many jobs, was put together by Pelosi.  It was as if she brought it to him and said, “Here, sign,” and he did.  Health care?  He talked a great deal about it, but five or more proposals sprouted from different committees and like a demolition derby, banged around until there was one left, dented, but still moving.

Guantanamo?  Iraq? Afghanistan?  A decision, no, no, no, we need to ponder and confer more. Despite putting the commander, McChrystal, in place, Obama can’t seem to agree or disagree with his recommendation.  And now, the granddaddy of them all, trying the 9/11 terrorists in New York.

Who’s the Boss?

This is what Barack Obama said:

“‘This is a prosecutorial decision as well as a national security decision.”

Er, no.  This is a decision for the Commander in Chief.  Don’t slough it of on some underling, no matter how lofty his title, so that at some future date you can put the blame on him.  As Harry Truman (D) said, “The buck stops here.”  It’s time, Mr. President, to step in, assert your constitutional authority and put a stop to this.  The military tribunals were set up and authorized by Congress for just this purpose.  It’s time to do the right thing.  You took an oath to preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, not to bow to your left wing base. 

 After 9/11, President Bush kept us safe  for seven and half years.  Less than a year into your presidency, we have had the worst terrorist attack on our soil since then.  This was preventable.  But we are already starting down the slippery slope of liberal happy talk and putting all Americans in harm’s way.  Consider this, if the jihadists had their way and actually defeated us and took over, the first place they would go to slaughter the devils would be Hollywood.  If you don’t want to protect America because it’s what you took an oath to do, then do it to save your Hollywood friends from themselves.

WASHINGTON (AP) – Vice President Joe Biden said the Obama administration “misread how bad the economy was” but stands by its stimulus package and believes the plan will create more jobs as the pace of its spending picks up.

Does that mean Obama lied?  Biden lied?  Where’s the outrage?

There is none, which is how it should be.  But it is instructive to contrast this with what happened with President Bush.  Bush relied on intelligence from the CIA, the French, the British and others.  It all pointed in the same direction.  The information was shared with Congress and there was overwhelming bi-partisan support authorizing the use of force in Iraq with 40% of Democrats voting in favor in the House and 58% in the Senate.  The senior members of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees, Republicans and Democrats saw the intelligence.  When it was later determined that weapons of mass destruction could not be found, the mantra was “Bush lied.”  The Democrats hid under their desks rather than refute that remark.

In the case of the stimulus, the projections of unemployment capping out at 8% rather than where it is today, prompting Biden’s mea culpa, was entirely within the control of the administration.  It wasn’t corroborated by other nations’ agencies.  In addition, every Republican in the House voted against it and all but three in the Senate.  So in which situation would there be a more credible charge of lying?

But unlike the Main Stream Media and the statists, I am reluctant accuse them of deliberately lying about their policies.  Perhaps, the aforementioned Main Stream Media and the statists will show some restraint in the future and return to the days of a spirited but honest debate on the issues?  I’m not holding my breath.

Paying the Bill

Elected by the drumbeat of bashing Bush, President Obama now faces reality, and the American people see example after example of Obama’s lack of experience.  He campaigned on how he was going to change the Bush Policies, and where are we?

• One of his first acts in office was an Executive Order to close Guantanamo.  Now, he doesn’t have a plan to make it happen and is saying exactly what Bush said, that there is not clear alternative.  Going further, he is turning Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan into his own version of Guantanamo
• He was going exit Iraq within 16 months.  Now, not so fast.  It’s not that easy, when you actually have responsibility, to follow through on shooting from the hip or lip.
• Military Tribunals were the wrong way to go.  Now, the military tribunals will continue
• The release of pictures demanded by the ACLU. Obama was in favor.  Now? Not so much.
• Obama now supports covert action in Pakistan

Bush’s Legacy

If Obama’s not careful he’s going to make Bush look like a genius.  But with every flip-flop, he puts America at risk.  Our allies such as Australia, wonder if we are the same strong world leader that we were before.

“President Barack Obama’s administration has continued this trend {against fighting a conventional war}, and risks unsettling America’s longstanding democratic allies in Asia by skimping on defense” — Australia Bulks Up, WSJ, May 6, 2009

Our enemies see this as signs of weakness and look for ways to exploit it.  Think Jimmy Carter and the Soviets in Afganistan, Khomeini in Iran, Sandanistas in Nicaragua…

Joe Biden said we would have a crisis withing six months.  I don’t know about the timing, but the pieces seem to be falling into place.

I Didn't Know About any Stinkin' Waterboarding!

I heard a Democratic pundit on TV today say that calling Nancy Pelosi a liar was way out of line. It was far too strong a term to use regarding this delicate matter.  As Tony Snow used to say from the podium in the White House briefing room, “ARE YOU KIDDING ME!?”

A Flexible Lexicon

How many times did we hear the phrase, “Bush lied, {fill in the blank}”?  Bush was accused repeatedly, lustily, full throated, spittle flying, of lying about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.  What is the definition of a lie?

“To make a statement that one knows is false, esp. with intent to deceive.” — YourDictionary.com

So, the CIA, the intelligence agencies of several allies, all provided information that indicated that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction.  Saddam had used weapons of mass destruction on the Kurds, and the Iranians.  So Bush reached the conclusion, which was backed by Congress, by their vote authorizing the use of force, and the UN that weapons of mass destruction existed.  Yes, they were all wrong, but how was Bush to know this information was false, when his advisors and the advisors of our allies said it was true?  So, how is this a lie?  Simple, a Republican is held to a higher standard than a Democrat.  For a Republican, a lie is whatever the Democrats say it is.  For a Democrat, a lie is whatever the Democrats say it is.

Dear Nancy

Nancy Pelosi sat in a room where she and Porter Goss were briefed on waterboarding, but she says she wasn’t briefed.  Documents prove she was there.  Porter Goss remembers her being there.  Did she have her fingers in her ears, stamping her feet, and yelling, “Nah, Nah, Nah, I can’t hear you!”?  Now let’s apply the above definition to dear Nancy.  She made several statements, all caught on video tape, vehemently denying that she knew waterboarding was actually used.  This was for one purpose only, to deceive the American people and her supporters, that she was not involved, nor did she approve in what has now been redefined as torture.

International Embarrassment

I don’t know about you, but I find it embarrassing to have such gutless people in positions of authority in government.  Say want you mean, mean what you say.  The bottom line is that these statists, have no principles.  They have no moral compass to guide their behavior.  Their only guide is how to tighten their grasp on power and how to take away as much liberty as possible from the American people.  In doing so, those same people will depend more and more on government and keep these moral midgets in power.

How much time do we have left before Joe Biden’s prophesy comes true that within six months of taking office Obama, and by extension we, will face an international crisis?  Well, unless you haven’t been paying attention, I think he will hit his mark before his 100 days are up.

Obama and Biden and the rest of their supporters have confused the difference between being liked and being respected.  Daniel Patrick Moynihan, while ambassador to the UN called the world, “A Dangerous Place.”  When trying to be a leader in a world that is dangerous, it is far better to be respected than liked.

The Obama Feel Good Tour

As President Obama tours the world and grovels at the feet of the Europeans, the Saudis, and Latin American dictators, trying to “repair the damage,” done by President Bush, our enemies are licking their chops.  The Europeans flocked to see him, touch him, kiss him, but when he asked for a commitment of more troops for Afghanistan, how did they respond?  Awkward silence and an offer of 5,000 troops to train police while at the same time an insistence that the “world” should have some say in the regulation of the U.S. economy.

While President Obama achieved his goal of improving the U.S.’s likability quotient, pirates were taking ships on the high seas, North Korea sent an ICBM over Japan, Iran celebrated Nuclear Technology Day, and the Taliban made inroads in Pakistan.  How did the popular leader respond?  To North Korea, he scolded that actions have consequences and words have meaning and proposed more words from the UN to be piled on top of the words the North Koreans are already ignoring.

Disarmament

To continue with the feel good groove, we have stopped calling terrorists terrorists.  Their acts are now to be called Man Caused Disasters and I guess the terrorists themselves are to be called Man Caused Disaster Causing Men (or Women).  After all, we don’t want them to be offended by being called terrorists.  Isn’t that was caused 9/11?  It was merely a response to our bad behavior, no?  Our lack of likability?

There is no longer a War on Terror.  It’s an Overseas Contingency Operation.  We don’t want to raise Osama bin Laden’s sensibilities thinking we might be at war with him, but we do need contingency planning in case something happens.  As a further show of good faith, let’s start re-writing the Al Qaeda training manual for them by telling them exactly what kind of interrogation techniques we use so that they can best prepare the training of their members to resist them.  Of course, we already swore we would never use them again anyway, but we have to make sure they are prepared for the infidel’s trickery.  Repeat after me: “I am not going to drown.  I am not going to drown.  I am not going to drown.”  There, it’s simple, now they can resist even our most diabolical torture.  But we shouldn’t forget to tell them that if an interrogator so much as raises his voice they should do the following:

1. Ask for a lawyer
2. Insist on having their Miranda rights given to them in both English (so their lawyers can verify it) and in their native tongue
3. A clean, untouched by infidels hands, copy of the Koran
4. Immediate transport to the United States
5. A green card
6. A path to citizenship
7. A tenured professorship at the college of their choice

If that doesn’t get them to lay down their arms, what will?

Respect Not Likability

The only time the United States is both respected and liked is when the bullets are flying and the United States is saving the hides of our new friends.  When the shooting stops or it is confined to a theater far away from the talkers, the United States will be disliked but, however begrudgingly, respected.

Ronald W. Reagan may have been liked personally in private but when the klieg lights were on, he was “an amiable dunce,” and  “a cowboy.”  But Reagan stood firm and put Pershing II missiles in Europe against all protests.  Such steadfastness led to the eventual arms negotiations and winning the cold war.  At the moment President Reagan took the oath of office, the Ayatollahs in Iran released the American hostages they held for 444 days.  They respected that Reagan would act, not just talk.

George W. Bush was not liked.  He was another cowboy, one who was inarticulate to boot.  But he was respected.  After 9/11 the world respected that he would hunt down and kill America’s enemies.  After the Iraq invasion, Libya publicly shut down their nuclear program.  Quadaffi didn’t want to be next.  President Bush kept America safe for seven years after 9/11.  Now, this Congress and this President want set aside over 200 years of precedent and to put them on trial for doing that.

Preparing for Our Enemies

President Obama plans to keep America secure by cutting our defense budget by 25%.  He plans on a staggering increase in our national debt and selling it to the Chinese.  Picture the Chinese doing to the USA what Obama did to General Motors.  Can you just see the head of the Chinese Communist Party saying to Obama, “Well, we own you now.  You’re fired.”

Can this Juggernaut be Stopped?

On April 15th over 1 million people gathered at Tea Parties around the country to protest the growth of government, the taking of our liberty and out of control taxes.  The Obama main stream media largely ignored the event, or willfully disparaged it.

A recent Rasmussen poll, “85% of mainstream Americans say the government has too much money and power, just 2% of the political class agree.”  If they have no bread, let them eat cake! The poll went on to say, “51% of Americans have a favorable view of the Tea Parties but the political class strongly disagrees.” {emphasis added}  How more out of touch with the people can they be?  How more arrogant in their shameless grab for power can they be?

I will end this post, my friends, with a quotation from the Declaration of Independence.

“WE hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness — That to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed, that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its Foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”

July 4, 1776

I hope to see you at the Tea Party on July 4, 2009

For all the Bush bashing that has gone on since September 11, 2001, it is a pretty sure bet that when he leaves office on January 20, 2009, part of his legacy will be that he kept us safe for the last seven years.  The fundamental difference between the polices of the Bush administration and those of Clinton and Carter was that Bush saw it as a war, Clinton and Carter as crimes.  On a war footing, you take the battle to your enemies with the objective of destroying them.  On a law and order footing, you investigate the crime after the fact, arrest suspects, give them their Miranda rights, put them on trial, and if you are lucky, they may spend some time in jail.

Law and Order

In 1979, where it all started, Iranian “students” took over the U.S. Embassy and held it for over 400 days.  Jimmy Carter tried to negotiate a settlement, sponsored a botched rescue, and saw the hostages finally released his last hour in office.  The Iranians didn’t want to be holding American hostages when Ronald Reagan was president.  Reagan would have seen the taking of the U.S. Embassy as an invasion on U.S. soil, which is what our Embassies are.  He would not have tolerated a ragtag bunch of radical students occupying U.S. soil.

From that, and Somalia, Osama bin Laden saw the U.S. as a paper tiger that would cut and run if hit hard.  Clinton’s law and order approach can be seen in the response to the first World Trade Center bombing and the constructing of a “wall” between the CIA and the FBI.

War Footing

President Bush saw the attacks on the U.S. as a war.  He mobilized the country and struck back hard.  By going on offense rather than hanging back playing defense, he has kept the enemy pinned down in Iraq and Afganistan, while simultaneous rooting them out aggressively wherever they went.  Those captured on the battlefield were sent to Guantanamo, where they were interrogated and held.  Lawyers in the U.S. began to complain that these prisoners were being held without being charged and that was unconstitutional.  Again, that is seeing it from a law and order perspective.  On a war footing, the enemy that is captured on the battlefield is held until the end of hostilities, like we held Japanese and German prisoners during WWII.  If it takes 50 years until the war is won and hostilities ended, then they should be held for 50 years.

Rooting Them Out

In trying to prevent another attack at home, Bush also aggressively sought to disrupt their operations.  Part of that process was to intercept their communications and learn what they were up to.  This caused an uproar over eavesdropping on Americans without a warrent.  However, the program was designed to intercept international phone calls, even if one end was in the U.S.  For example, if an Al Queda terrorist is captured or killed on the battlefield but their cell phone is recovered and their cell phone has an address book in it, the administration would set up all the numbers in the address book to be monitored and calls listened to. The purpose was to keep all Americans safe.

Many on the left believe that people in the Bush administration should be prosecuted for this practice.  They call this activity criminal.

Who Are Your Enemies?

President Bush tried to prevent our enemies, those who wished to kill as many of us as possible, from doing us harm.  He knew our enemies to be deadly and ruthless.

And then you have Joe Wurzelbacher, aka Joe the Plumber.  Joe the Plumber had the audacity to ask Barack Obama a question about how Obama’s policies would affect people like Joe.  Pretty dangerous stuff, no?  Since that chance encounter, Joe the Plumber has been investigated by six Ohio state agencies.  Did you see the ACLU representative on the evening news demanding what the Obama campaign knew about this and when they knew it?  Did you see Chris Matthews slamming his hand on his desk and saying, “This is AMERICA, not the Soviet Union!  We don’t investigate citizens because of their political beliefs.”?  Did you hear Senator Dick Durban rise in the senate to decry what happened to Joe the Plumber and compare it to the Nazis, the Soviet Gulags, and Pol Pot?

Neither did I.