The Democrats are nothing if not persistent. After trying to hang this dismal economy on President Bush while the Obama administration repeats every mistake from the Great Depression to create their own version, Tim Bishop says let’s go all in!
Secretary of State
Democrat Tim Bishop recently sent an e-mail to his constituents blaming Republicans, although they only hold the House while Democrats hold the Senate and the White House, for being against bipartisanship. So what does Tim Bishop do when the opportunity for bipartisanship presents itself? He cements his far left credentials by voting against it.
httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3DB-hJVLVh0&hd=1
Kirsten Gillibrand and Joe DioGuardi battle it out in a televised debate. Here are some of the highlights.
Kirsten Gillibrand was elected to Congress as a relatively conservative Democrat. She received a grade of “A” from the National Rifle Association and she was counted among the Blue Dog Democrats. After Hillary Clinton became Secretary of State, Gillibrand was appointed to Clinton’s vacant senate seat. Since joining the senate she has changed her positions 180 degrees. The National Rifle Association now gives her a grade of “F”. She now votes lockstep with Harry Reid.
Joe DioGuardi is a Certified Public Accountant who has previously served in Congress. His position is focused on the fiscal issues we currently face and his objective is to go to Washington and approach it like an accountant to get their fiscal house in order.
Here are their key positions:
- Gillibrand supports ObamaCare, DioGuardi thinks ObamaCare should be repealed and we should start over, beginning with tort reform
- Gillibrand supports a public option and appears to support taxpayer funding of abortions
- Gillibrand says she is strongly opposed to outsourcing but voted for the GM bailout after which GM increased offshore production
- Gillibrand denies that she or Andrew Cuomo had anything at all to do with the housing bubble.
Senator Gillibrand is running from her record as fast as her legs will carry her. Although she does deserve credit for admitting she supported ObamaCare although she would be hard pressed to deny it. She thinks that ObamaCare is just swell, though, and the only thing to continue working on is those big, bad, insurance companies that have the temerity to raise premiums, something that conservatives said would happen from the beginning.
In New York we have the unusual situation of voting for two senators in the same year. Chuck Schumer is the incumbent running for reelection and Kirsten Gillibrand was appointed to the Senate to fill Hillary Clinton’s vacant seat when the latter became Secretary of State in the Obama administration. So in some respects, Ms. Gillibrand is running for the Senate for the first time rather than as an incumbent.
As a Congresswoman in 2007 she was a member of the “Blue Dog” coalition of conservative Democrats. In the Senate Ms. Gillibrand has been quiet as a church mouse. Perhaps that is because she doesn’t want people to notice her metamorphosis from a moderate Democrat from upstate New York with a 100% approval rating from the National Rifle Association to another far left Harry Reid “pet”, voting with the Democratic leadership 97% of the time. Now that she is in the Senate she has been endorsed for election by a leading gun control group which the NRA strongly opposes which prompted this response from the NRA
“She was either being dishonest with her voters in the congressional district or she’s being dishonest to the voters in New York state,” said the NRA’s chief lobbyist, Chris W. Cox. “Either way, the key word is dishonest.”
Gillibrand’s spokesman had no comment.
Ms. Gillibrand voted in favor of giving stockholders a vote on executive compensation in corporations. Does she favor giving Americans a vote on her and her colleagues’ compensation? In July 2009, she voted yes on a Congressional pay raise. So we need to keep those greedy corporate types in check, but she gets to vote herself a raise? But that’s not all; when as an attorney she represented corporations she had a very different role. As an attorney representing Philip Morris her job was to keep the Department of Justice from finding out that Philip Morris’ own research showed that tobacco was harmful.
“So when the Justice Department tried to get its hands on that research in 1996 to prove that tobacco industry executives had lied about the dangers of smoking, the company moved to fend off the effort with the help of a highly regarded young lawyer named Kirsten Rutnik [now Gillibrand].” – New York Times, March 26, 2009
Call it inconsistent, but whatever you call it, Ms. Gillibrand doesn’t like to talk about it.
From being the foregone conclusion as the first woman President of the United States in 2008 to a marginalized, snarky misrepresentative of the United States, it time for her to realize, the band stopped playing and everyone has gone home but her. It’s time to call it a day and resign.
Keep Your Friends Close and Your Enemies Closer
Proving, once again, he is the master of hardball politics, Barack Obama dangled the Secretary of State job in front of his vanquished rival. She took the bait. No more would she be a force in the Senate able to challenge Obama at the first stumble. She was now part of the problem, not a potential solution. Once ensconced at Foggy Bottom, she thought she enhance her image by holding the most prestigious post in the Cabinet. But she again underestimated Barack Obama.
He proceeded to divvy up foreign policy among many advisers, undercutting Hillary every step of the way. She’s no fool, she can see it and it is eating away at her, to the point where she is becoming a gaffe machine to rival Joe Biden.
She’s No Condoleezza Rice
Upstaged by her husband in North Korea, negotiating the release of the journalist hostages, she was asked what her husband thought about another matter while in Africa. In a similar situation, Condoleezza Rice, would have handled that with aplomb and not become rattled. But here is Hillary’s response. Hillary Snaps. Smacking down a questioner on the world stage? Well that will surely “correct” our image as the Ugly Americans.
The Apology Tour Continues
She goes on to make a speech in Nigeria and wants to emphasize that there is no place in the world for corrupt elections. A very good point to make, that few could argue with. But what does she use as an analogy? She openly suggests that Jeb Bush fixed the 2000 Presidential election for his brother. Of all the analogies of corrupt elections that she could have used, let’s see, Iran? Cuba? the old Soviet Union? she points to the oldest democracy in history and suggest that we are as corrupt as any third world dictator. Hillary Compares U.S. Elections to Third World Corruption. Disgraceful, absolutely disgraceful. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who endorsed Hillary to take his Senate seat, must be turning over in his grave. He used to staunchly defend the United States at the UN and here his protege is saying we are no better than the worst of them.
In Honduras, the rule of law is being followed to prevent a Chavez style dictator from taking over that country, and who does Hillary and the Obama administration support? The Chavez puppet. What about standing up for democracy in our Hemisphere? It is time for her to go.
The Gore Thing in 2000
Let’s get this straight one more time. On election night 2000, Gore lost Florida. He lost the recount. He lost the re-recount. He lost the re-re-recount. He lost the official recount. He lost the private recount sponsored by newspapers.
Their count showed that Bush’s razor-thin margin of 537 votes — certified in December by the Florida Secretary of State’s office — would have tripled to 1,665 votes if counted according to standards advocated by his Democratic rival, former Vice President Al Gore.
“In the end, I think we probably confirmed that President Bush should have been president of the United States,” said Mark Seibel, the paper’s managing editor. “I think that it was worthwhile because so many people had questions about how the ballots had been handled and how the process had worked.” — CNN
If Democrats and their radical supporters want to salve their wounds with this myth, live the fantasy. But don’t smear this country with these lies while acting as our chief diplomat.
Brothers in Arms
When I first heard the news of a “coup d’etat” in Honduras I thought, “This isn’t good.” America cannot be a champion of democracy if we only support democracies where we like the outcome. Recall the coup in Venezuela that ousted Hugo Chavez for a couple of days, and we got behind it. But he was elected and to avoid being hypocrites we have to support the process.
Not So Fast
As more news came out about exactly what happened in Honduras, it became clearer that the military was following the democratic process not subverting it. The bad news is that while President Obama kept silent or tepid at best regarding Iran, he came out forcefully on the side of Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez condemning the military’s action in Honduras.
Here is a rundown on what is going on in Honduras as reported in the Wall Street Journal on June 29 and June 30:
- Honduran President Manuel Zalaya is term limited. He wanted to put a referendum on the ballot to change the constitution and lift the limits on his term so that he could be re-elected.
- While Honduran law allows for a re-write of the constitution the power to do that does not lie with the president but with its Congress.
- Zalaya declared the vote on his own and got the ballots to distribute from Hugo Chavez in Venezuela
- The Honduran Supreme Court ruled that the referendum was illegal because such referendums are forbidden by the constitution within six months of an election.
- The military followed the Supreme Court ruling and refused to distribute the ballots which is its usual role
- Zalaya fired the chief of the army and planned to proceed with the referendum against the Supreme Court ruling
- The Supreme Court ordered the general be reinstated, Zalaya refused
- The Honduran Attorney General and the Supreme Court said Mr. Zalaya would be prosecuted if he followed through
- Zalaya decided to proceed. Supporters broke into where the ballots were being held and distributed them against the Supreme Court order
- Zalaya was arrested and is in exile in Costa Rica
- The Honduran Congress met in emergency session and named the President of Congress as the interim president of the country. They further stated that the elections would proceed on schedule in November. The military was no longer in control. The Supreme Court said the military acted on its orders
A Disturbing Pattern
Maybe it’s just me, but I see a disturbing pattern here. In Iran where democracy is being clearly trashed, President Obama was extraordinarily restrained in criticizing the mullahs, while they shot their people in cold blood for exercising free speech and free assembly. In Honduras, the government is carefully following the rule of law and its constitution while its president tries turn it into a dictatorship along the lines of Venezuela, and they are roundly condemned by President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton. President Obama lines up with Ahminedinjad, Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez, and against democracy.
Here at home he is orchestrating a massive expansion of government power and intrusion into every last detail of our lives. Our liberty to live our lives as we choose is draining away. I’m concerned. Are you?
I’ll see you at the Tea Party tonight in New York.
Wobbly Republicans
The drumbeat is starting. The Democrats are gleefully opening their playbook to the right page and holding it open for the weak kneed Republicans to see. “If you vote against Judge Sotomayor, the Hispanic vote will go against you and make you pay.”
Ah, the politics of class warfare. Republicans fall for it almost every time. That’s why we got John McCain as our nominee. The news analysis will point out how fewer Hispanics voted for McCain than for Bush, with Bush getting 40% and McCain only 31%. Maybe it was because McCain was a weak candidate? Bush put forward Miguel Estrada for the Supreme Court, he appointed Alberto Gonzales as the first Hispanic Attorney General, McCain and Bush were both for open borders. Boy, did that pay off!
Bush appoints Colin Powell as the first black Secretary of State, followed by Condoleezza Rice as the first black woman Secretary of State. So how did the black vote turn out for Bush?
So let’s get over copying the Democratic practice of appealing to groups and get back to our conservative principles of appealing to individuals. Don’t worry about the black vote, the Hispanic vote, the gay vote, the union vote, the Catholic vote. Worry about doing the right thing for all Americans. The Democrats want us to worry about all these blocs so that they can get us to meekly wave through their nominees. But when the tables are turned (e.g., Clarence Thomas, Michael Steele, Miguel Estrada, et. al.) they will be vicious, slanderous, mean and ugly. They don’t give a damn about offending the black or Hispanic vote because they think they own them. And when we put up candidates that are a weak imitation of the Democratic candidate, they do.
We need to stand for Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness and not back down from that. The votes will follow.
