The pursuit of Constitutionally grounded governance, freedom
and individual liberty
"There
is but one straight course, and that is to seek truth and pursue it
steadily." --George
Washington
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
White House to Send Millions to Detroit
Even
as the nation sits on the edge of a financial crisis driven by the need to
incur more debt, the White House has found $300 million to send to mismanaged,
financially beleaguered Detroit, according
to CNN.
The
money is being taken “from programs that are available for cities across the
nation, not just Detroit.” The action amounts to a backdoor assistance plan
that effectively circumvents Congress, which would not support a bailout. A
White House official was vague on how the money had been cobbled together. According
to an
AP story, which had stated the total at $100 million:
Gene
Sperling, chief economic adviser to President Obama, said the administration
scrounged through the federal budget and found untapped money that “either had
not flowed or had not gotten out or not directed to the top priorities for
Detroit.”
How
it is that there is $300 million lying around for Detroit is unclear.
~~~~~~
The Republican
Endgame
by Mark
Alexander
Despite
all the Leftist rhetoric about ObamaCare being "the law which must now be
funded," it was wholly rejected by Republicans in the Senate and House,
along with many House Democrats. Thus, proposals to defund it, delay it or
amend it are exactly in line with what our Founders expected legislators to do
in the interest of defending and sustaining Rule of Law.
After
41 previous attempts to delay or amend this behemoth, House Republicans
attached a "defund" DemoCare condition to its Continuing Resolution
legislation (CR being that "pass the buck" gimmick to fund government
without actually passing a budget -- which has not been done since George
Bush's last year in office). Using the CR to make their case against
nationalized health care effectively elevated Republican objections above the
political din -- thanks in large measure to the much-maligned efforts of Sen.
Ted Cruz. Republicans had no intention of "shutting down government,"
but have used the CR to force Democrat votes on defunding, delaying or amending
key ObamaCare mandates.
Here
is the Republican endgame (yes, there is one, even if GOP
"leadership" is trying to catch up with the rank and file): There
is a growing grassroots storm brewing in opposition to socialized medicine, now
that the reality and consequences of ObamaCare are starting to sink in. Accordingly,
some non-establishment Republicans in the House and Senate have thrown up a
DemoCare dare, a measure to defund this job-killing budget-buster, which is
really a strategic long shot effort to delay implementation of the
"individual mandate" until after the 2014 election when Republicans
believe they will have generated enough political opposition to the plan to
significantly modify major portions of the law. Indeed, Obama has, for political
expediency, already unilaterally (and unconstitutionally) delayed
implementation of the employer mandate.
Of
course, the House "defund tactic" won't pass the Demo-controlled
Senate, so Republicans are banking that Demo Majority Leader Harry Reid will
strip that measure from the current Continuing Resolution and
send it back to the House, where Republicans will return a clean CR, but then
replace "defund" with "delay" as a condition for raising
the debt ceiling, which we hit sometime between 17 and 22 October.
Additionally, they will return the debt ceiling legislation to the Senate with
a "wish list" of other amendments, which should include one
requiring that all members of the House and Senate and their staffs will be
subject to all provisions of ObamaCare, as well as other items to
include tax reform, approval of the Keystone pipeline, regulatory and
entitlement reforms including means-tested Medicare, and a "chained"
Consumer Price Index (CPI).
The
delay measure, and most if not all of the other Republican amendments, will be
rejected by the Senate, at which point Republicans should get out of the way
and let the Senate send the Continuing Resolution and the upcoming debt ceiling
legislation to Obama, thus allowing the ObamaCare mandates to go into effect as
scheduled. (There is an old adage: When your adversary is defeating himself, don't
interfere.)
The
net effect of the Republican strategy is that, in advance of 2014, Democrats in
the House and Senate will have to vote on a lot of measures and then will have
to defend those votes ahead of the 2014 elections. In regard to the measure to
"delay" the implementation of ObamaCare, Demo votes against that
"compromise" will be judged harshly in states and districts with only
modest support for ObamaCare, amid growing grassroots protests against Obama's
socialized medicine scheme.
What will drive those
grassroots protests?
Obama,
the consummate narcissist, having embraced the name "ObamaCare," will
himself, along with current and future generations of Democrats, suffer a
reversal of political fortunes after ObamaCare is implemented. Why? Because
every American of every political stripe who has any issue with health care,
whether a hangnail or heart transplant, a delay in a doctor's office or in
critical care for a loved one, will tie blame for their discontent like a noose
around the necks of Obama and his Democrats, who were solely responsible for
forcing this abomination upon the American people. No matter how Fab-Tastic
ObamaCare may be for some Demo constituencies, Democrats are going to be the
target of every health care complaint.
Even
Demo National Committee chair and Florida Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz can see
that pitfall from her perspective in the House. She is insisting that Democrats
"must not treat every minute provision in the law as sacred." She
added that Demos "should be open to suggestions for improving the
law." If Republicans successfully herd the inevitable consumer
dissatisfaction and anger toward Democrats, the electoral awards will be
substantial in 2014, 2016 and beyond. Of course, given that establishment
Republican have a propensity for snatching defeat from the jaws of victory,
that's a big "if."
~~~~~~
How Liberals Hijacked The Word “Extremist” To Scare
Voters By Frank Camp
What
is extremism? To most of us, the word extremism evokes images of Nazis, the
KKK, radical Islamists, and other such groups that take their beliefs to the
outermost edges.
Because of the association between the word “extremist,” and acts of
radical violence, the concept of taking an idea to its outer edges is generally
viewed as dangerous or unnecessary. However, this is all a cultural concoction,
based on fear. The word “extremist” has been hijacked, as well as the core concept of
standing on one end of a spectrum of ideas.
I
was watching CNN yesterday at the gym. Anderson Cooper was speaking with
several guests about Ted Cruz’s 21 hour filibuster. One of the guests began to
speak at length about how the American people have become afraid because the
Republican Party has been hijacked by extremists. His tone suggested
that he not only viewed Ted Cruz as an extremist, but that Cruz, by nature of
being labeled as such, was inherently bad.
In
his book The Tyranny of Cliches: How Liberals Cheat in the War of Ideas,
Jonah Goldberg writes about how the word “extremist” has been painted as
evil. He argues that centrists think themselves more sophisticated than
so-called extremists. The following is an excerpt:
“There’s
a certain Goldilocks bias to discussions of politics: If Papa Bear’s porridge
is too hot and Mama Bear’s porridge is too cold, then Baby Bear’s is always
just right. It must work the same way in politics, right? Centrists,
moderates…independents: they all suffer from variants of this confusion. The
‘extreme’ Republicans argue 10. The ‘extreme’ Democrats argue for 0. Therefore
the smart, sensible, reasonable position must be 5. Well, the Wahhabis want to
kill all the gays and Jews. The Sufis don’t want to kill any gays or Jews. So
the moderate, sensible position must be to kill just the gays, but not the
Jews…the point is that sometimes the ‘extreme’ is 100 percent correct, while
the centrist position is 100 percent wrong.”
Goldberg
goes on to claim that self-titled “independents” are simply not
paying attention. He argues—and I agree—that behind the faux
sophistication of centrists lies a confusion and a slap-dash understanding of
politics. The Democrats are great at labeling. They create slogans and campaign
phrases designed to keep voters from actually thinking. In addition, they use
the word “extremist” to demonize Conservatives. What does holding “extreme”
views actually mean? According to Liberals, it means that Conservatives stand
on the fringes, or outer edges of opinion, far away from the center,
which—according to their made up rules—means that Conservative beliefs are far
from “normal.” And if Conservatives aren’t normal, they must be weird, and
probably wrong.
Using
the center as the definition of normal or typical is completely arbitrary!
First, the Democrats are certainly not in the center. Second, why is the center
so sought after? There are valid reasons to take sides. Most issues have such
stark differences that to have an opinion at all means taking a side. For
example, you either believe abortion is murder, or you don’t. Where is the
middle ground on that? You either believe in socialism or capitalism;
they are not compatible. There are those who claim otherwise, but they
are wrong. Those who attempt to meld bits and pieces from each philosophy into
a cohesive whole have no idea how the world works. Centrism is naïveté at its height.
The
word “extremist” has been hijacked by the Left to scare voters away from
Conservatism. But
when broken down, extremism simply means having an opinion. Labeling the center as “normal”
is beyond arbitrary, it’s incorrect. Once we set aside the foolish idea that
the center is political ground zero, extremism suddenly doesn’t mean
much—and it doesn’t sound that scary.
~~~~~
"The natural cure for an ill-administration, in a popular
or representative constitution, is a change of men." –Alexander Hamilton, Federalist No. 21,
1787
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