Saturday, May 30, 2009

Random Thoughts From a Busy Week

Watching the news unfold this week as I vacationed with the family, here’s my thoughts from this past weeks news cycle. 

On Judge Sonia Sotomayor:

I just don’t understand how a judge that’s been overturned by the US Supreme Court so many times can be qualified to serve on the US Supreme Court.  Forget her racist statement about her being a “latina woman” somehow qualifies her for the court more than a “white guy.”  That’s a trap for the stupid, spineless Republican’s to fall into.  Instead, let’s examine her record.

Case in point: 60% of Sotomayer’s cases that have been referred toimage the US Supreme court have been overturned on legal grounds, for issues Sotomayer overlooked.  If you and I were that wrong in performing our daily jobs and were constantly corrected by our bosses wouldn’t we be fired instead of promoted?

Case in point #2: Ricci v. New Haven, CT  which is in front of the US Supreme Court right now, and will likely result in yet another overturn of Sotomayer.  In this case, Sotomayer ruled in favor of racial politics against twenty white and hispanic firefighters passed over for promotion when the city of New Haven, CT refused to implement the results of a promotion test upon which black firefighters didn’t perform as well as their counter parts.

In this specific case, Sotomayer completely ignored the fact that each firefighter had the same opportunities, access to resources, and time to prepare for the test, thus providing a level playing field for all. 

A total of 118 applicants took the two tests for promotion to lieutenant or captain in late 2003, and 59 earned passing scores. Because there were limited vacancies, only the top scorers were eligible for promotion -- a group of 17 whites, and two Hispanics. None of the 27 black firefighters with passing scores was eligible.

One of the firefighters, Frank Ricci who is dyslexic, said he prepared exhaustively for the test and paid to have study materials recorded so he could learn by listening.

Ricci scored the highest on the exam.

At hearings in July 2006, the firefighters' lawyer, Karen Lee Torre, argued the city tossed the exams because elected officials were worried about losing support among black voters. 

The city's attorney, Richard Roberts, denied the allegation. He said the city's only motive was avoiding a discrimination suit from minority firefighters. (Hmmm, this isn’t playing politics with people’s lives at all now is it?)

In her ruling, Sotomayer declared the City of New Haven’s actions in throwing out all test results was stating “the city's effort to avoid discriminating against minority firefighters was "race neutral," because "all the test results were discarded, no one was promoted, and firefighters of every race will have to participate in another selection process."”

At US Supreme Court oral arguments in April of this yeaimager, Justice  Antonin Scalia scoffed at the claim that rejecting the results was racially neutral. "It's neutral because you throw it out for the losers as well as for the winners?" he asked. "That's neutrality?"

image Chief Justice John Roberts also questioned Sotomayer’s ruling asking “Does the city get do-overs until it comes out right?”

It appears that the US Supreme Courts solidly Conservative majority is about to rule against Obama’s nominee, Sotomayer.

So what is Obama’s reasoning in nominating Sotomayer anyway?

Perhaps this quote from an interview of Barack Hussein Obama on National Public Radio in 2001 explains Sotomayor’s nomination:

"The Constitution is a charter of negative liberties. ...it says what the federal government can't do for you, but it doesn't say what the federal government or the state government must do on your behalf"

Barack Hussein Obama

Interview, National Public Radio June 2001

As Sotomayer is an activist judge who on video stated it was the Appeals Court’s job to “make policy” Obama gets something he wants in Sotomayer: a Supreme Court Judge who will help him break down the barriers that the US Constitution created by barring the Federal Government from intruding in our daily lives.

The Founding Fathers in adopting the Constitution recognized that the Federal Government had two roles.  The first was to provide for the common defense.  The second was to get the hell out of the way of the American people.  As such, the Constitution reserves all rights that are not expressly granted to the Federal Government to the individual States.

Thank goodness for a Conservative Majority on the US Supreme Court, it may be the only thing standing between the United States of America and complete Marxism at the hands of “The One.”

North Korea

Surely the entire world is laughing at “The One” right about now. image Here we have a Communist dictator, a complete nutjob playing Obama like the fool he is.  A successful nuclear test, detonating a bomb the size of that used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and a number of missile tests that have gone unanswered by Obama and his band of merry minions sure makes the United States look weak, doesn’t it?

So weak that Vladimir Putin and Iran’s Mahmoud Ahmenidijad have “challenged” Obama to a debate at the Useless Nations (U.N.)

I sure hope Obummer accepts, it should be fun to watch.

Jimmy Carter

Must be the happiest man on the planet right about now, finally someone’s come along that’s proving to be a worse President than even he was.

The Economy

Ok, someone tell me how continuing to lose 600,000+ jobs a month4rde04[7] under Obummer is somehow better than 4.7% unemployment under Bush.  Please, the economy is NOT getting better, it’s getting WORSE.  We have a record number of cargo ships and shipping containers sitting idle as the economy continues to lose steam.  In the first quarter of 2009, the economy actually shrank at a record 5.9%. 

Yeah, but the Democrat talking points say the economy is finally getting better.  How about telling that to the 13% that are unemployed in Michigan and California?  Or how about telling the near 8,000,000 people that are unemployed that “hope and change” is coming their way? 

Where’d That 2Trillion Dollars Go Anyway?

GM took more than $50 billion in bailout money, only to go into bankruptcy anyway.

Chrysler took $20 billion.

Banks took $787 billion.

That leaves about $1.2 Trillion Dollars that the Obama Administration literally pissed away, completely unaccounted for.

But wait!  The Obama Administration said they “saved” 150,000 jobs in their first 100 days!  That’s about what, $800k per job saved if my public school education is correct?  Yep, real bargain there!  Let’s just piss away $1.2 Trillion dollars to “save” 150,000 jobs.

Did I mention that of those 150,000 jobs “saved” the Federal Government accounted for 66,000 of them in new hires?

Kinda makes one want to stop paying their taxes, doesn’t it?

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Obama: “We’re Out of Money!”

Hey America, what’s in your wallet?  Nothing, now that Obama’s done spending all your (and your children’s, and grandchildren’s) money.

When did you ever think that a sitting President of the United States of America would tell the world that we as a country are financially broke?

Maybe it has something to do with the TRILLIONS of dollars that Obama spent that we didn’t have which financially ruined America.

Or maybe it' has something to do with the 65+ million idiots that voted the worst President since Jimmy Carter into office.

Or perhaps .. just perhaps it’s both.

No wonder North Korea, Russia and Iran are laughing at us, challenging “The One” to a debate at the Useless Nations.  They know a rank amateur when they see one:

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Obama is going to be such an abysmal failure as President (oh hell, he already is!) that at the end of the day he’s ultimately going to make Jimmy Carter look good by comparison.

What’s in your wallet?  Nothing.  Obama spent it all!

Monday, May 25, 2009

On This Memorial Day ….

image

For Freedom’s Way

For freedom’s way the patriots bled
The crosses mark our honored dead

More clearly than mere words e’er may
That field lays out their final say

No greater love, they gave it all
In answer to man’s highest call

But don’t forget that most returned
To them we owe esteem they earned

And last of all, remember this:
Our LORD betrayed by one mere kiss

For from within, true danger lies
Though carefully as friend disguised

So fight, my friend, from where you stand
For freedom rides on every man

-- Tom Hoefling

Friday, May 22, 2009

In Memoriam

To the hero’s lost on Sept. 11th, 2001, for those who have served our country, and those lost in battle.

God Bless America, and especially those who gave their lives in her defense.

Thursday, May 21, 2009

Obama Not The First Head Of State to Design Cars

Guess Who The Other Was?

Rachel Madsen, Human Events

“Sitting at a restaurant table in Munich in the summer of 1932, Hitler designed the prototype for what would become the immensely successful Beetle design for Volkswagen (literally, the "car of the people"),” says the Hitler Historical Museum’s website.  He then said to the head of Daimler-Benz:  “Take it with you and speak with people who understand more about it than I do. But don't forget it. I want to hear from you soon, about the technical details.09_05_15_ObamaRepair "

This week, Obama imposed on American car manufacturers strict fuel efficiency and emissions standards, to be introduced in 2012.  Manufacturers will reportedly get extra pats on the head for cranking out electric cars like General Motors’ Chevy Volt -- which will soak American consumers for about $40,000.  In other words, they’re going to make cars only hippies want, at prices only CEOs can afford.  Don’t like it?  Then ride a bike or take the bus.

These aren’t going to be Hummers or 4x4s, because the simple laws of physics dictate that the heavier something is, the more energy it takes to move it.  These are going to be little bitty cars like the ones I see in Paris, none of which are physically capable of hauling both me and my luggage to the airport. 

(Excerpt, for full article click here)

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

The Eve Of The American Reawakening

As voters in the State of California (unarguably the most liberal, left-leaning state in the country) went to the polls yesterday, they soundly defeated no less than seven tax initiatives designed to close a $41 billion dollar budget deficit, by raising taxes on everything from clothes, electronics, cars, license plates and increasing the state income tax.

What does it mean when the most liberal, left-leaning state in the country rejects raising taxes?

Simply stated, it means we’re on the eve of an American Reawakening that Government is often the problem, and not the solution.

Today we present California State Representative Tom McClintock’s speech in front of the Council for National Policy in Washington DC, dated Saturday May 16th – just days ahead of California’s tax increase referendums.  Read on and be heartened that the battle for our great country is not yet over.  Nay, it has hardly begun.  The national Republican Party would do themselves a great service by listening to McClintock’s advice, which is founded in basic Reagan principles.

Tom McClintock speech to Council for National Policy, Washington DC Saturday, May 16th, 2009:

Here, in the winter of our despair, I want to pause to take stock of the state of our nation on this date of May 16th. McClintock

Voters have swept our party from office after a failed Republican administration that abandoned conservative principles. The most left-wing President in our nation’s history has taken office with a 66 percent approval rating and strong majorities in both houses. His agenda includes radical intervention into energy markets, highly inflationary monetary policy, a determination to dramatically reduce our military spending while dramatically increasing overall domestic spending with deficits as far as the eye can see.

That was the state of our nation on May 16th…1977.

You remember those years. Jimmy Carter’s policies brought us double digit unemployment AND double digit inflation; interest rates at 21 percent, mile-long lines around gas stations, embassies seized with impunity and a military so weak it couldn’t even project a simple rescue mission.

But then, just a few years later, it was morning again in America. Four years of Jimmy Carter produced eight years of Ronald Reagan, and looking back on it, that wasn’t such a bad trade, was it?

Abraham Lincoln once said that if the voters get their backsides too close to the fire, they’ll just have to sit on the blisters for a while.

The American people have some very painful blisters to sit on for the next four years, but the good news is that they’re already starting to figure that out.

On inauguration day, the Rasmussen poll gave the President a net approval rating of 28 points. Yesterday, that figure was seven points. During the fall campaign, Rasmussen reported that the generic Democratic candidate for Congress had a 16-point advantage over the generic Republican candidate. As of May 10th, Rasmussen reports the generic Republican now has a one-point advantage over the Democrat.

Although the President’s personal popularity remains high, most polls are showing a decidedly increasing skepticism over his policies. For example, yesterday Rasmussen reported that by a margin of 57 to 19 percent, Americans say that tax increases will hurt the economy.

What we are seeing in the polls is the gradual awakening of the American people. When things are going reasonably well – or even reasonably poorly – most people don’t pay a lot of attention to politics because there are too many other pressing things going on in their lives. But when a crisis approaches, that’s when you see the strength of a Democracy emerge, and it is an awesome thing. One by one, individual citizens sense the approach of a common danger and rise to the occasion. They begin focusing a great deal of attention on politics and they start making very good decisions.

We saw that two summers ago, when the McCain-Kennedy amnesty bill was set to glide through both houses of Congress on broad bi-partisan majorities. But the American people had finally had enough of being told there was nothing the government cared to do to defend the integrity of our borders and the sovereignty of our nation. And McCain Kennedy didn’t even make it to a final vote.

We saw that last summer, when gasoline prices hit $4 a gallon and the American people had finally had enough of being told there was nothing the government cared to do to get out of the way of domestic oil production. And in the span of just a few months, they turned 180 degrees on the issue of offshore oil drilling and nuclear power.

We saw that just a month ago, when Rick Santelli told a routine cable broadcast that he was sick and tired of being forced to pay his neighbor’s mortgage – and the whole trading floor erupted in applause. He suggested that Americans need to rekindle the spirit that produced the Boston Tea Party, and suddenly, from every corner of America over 800 taxpayer protests erupted across the country on April 15th. These protests weren’t sponsored by parties or politicians. They were a grassroots uprising by a silent majority that will not remain silent any longer.

And yet I read the other day of a new chorus of hand-wringing that said we had to get over our nostalgia for Reagan, that we had to be mindful and respectful of the fact the “other side has something,” and that we have nothing, and that “you can’t beat something with nothing.

It’s the same kind of hand-wringing that Ulysses S. Grant confronted at the Battle of the Wilderness among generals overawed by Robert E. Lee’s aggressiveness, audacity and success. Grant, turned to his distraught generals, and said “Bobby Lee this, and Bobby Lee that! You’d think he’s going to do double somersaults and outflank us on both sides and the rear. Stop thinking about what Bobby Lee’s going to do to us, and start thinking about what we’re going to do to Bobby Lee. Now get some guns up here.”

To those who say we should put the Reagan era behind us – I have a better idea. Let’s put the Bush era behind us.

To those who say we should redefine our principles, I have a better idea: we don’t need to redefine our principles; we need to return to them.

To those of the Republican establishment, who misled our party for years, who dismantled so much of what Ronald Reagan accomplished and now tell us “the other side has something” and we have nothing. To them I can’t improve upon Cromwell’s words: “You have sat here too long for any good you have been doing; it is not fit that you should sit here any longer. You shall now give way to better men. Now depart and let us have done with you, I say, in the name of God, GO!”

“The other side has something and we have nothing?”

What is the something the other side has – that some say we have to be respectful and mindful of?

Statism. Shortage. Paternalism. That’s their “something” that seems to so overawe and over-impress these scions of a failed party establishment.

Statism, Shortage and Paternalism is what we are told to be mindful and respectful of? I don’t think so.

Their statism is “something” so extreme that the entire national debt accumulated from the first day of the George Washington administration to the very last day of the George W. Bush administration will literally double in the next five years and triple in the next ten.

The tax increases already proposed to support it will rob every family of more than $2,500 from its purchasing power every year. We’re supposed to respect that? The American people don’t respect it. The American people know that you cannot spend your way rich; that you cannot borrow your way out of debt and you cannot tax your way to prosperity. And they know that if you live well beyond your means today, you must of necessity live well BELOW your means in the future. And that’s not a future we want for our children.

Their entire policy is predicated on maintaining shortages of everything from health care to energy and then using the force of government to ration that shortage according to their own whims. The “something” that they propose to solve their government-induced shortages is having bureaucrats tell us what medical treatments our kids may have and when they may have them; raising energy prices until we bicycle to work; telling us what kind of light bulbs to use, where to set our thermostats, when to use our appliances.

And then there’s Paternalism. That’s what Rick Santelli was talking about. When your neighbor buys the house he can’t afford – it’s now your job to pay his mortgage. When the fraternity brothers of Paulson and Geitner party their investments into the ground – now it’s your job to cover their losses. When the reckless country-clubbers of General Motors and Chrysler give away the farm to the UAW – now it’s your job to make up the difference, and by the way, now it’s Barney Frank’s job to tell you what kind of car you may buy.

That is the “something” that seems to send these self-described “New Republicans,” into paroxysms of awe and policy-envy.

That’s the “something” that some people are so deathly afraid of saying “NO” to. Churchill said, “Alexander the Great remarked that the people of Asia were slaves because they had not learned to pronounce the word “NO.” Let that not be the epitaph of the English-speaking peoples or of parliamentary democracy … There, in one single word, is the resolve which the forces of freedom and progress, of tolerance and goodwill, should take.”

What is the “nothing” that we have that so dismays and disgusts these same messiahs of mediocrity – this “nothing” that’s convinced them that we must wean ourselves from our unseemly nostalgia with such irrelevant has-beens as Reagan, and Lincoln and Jefferson – I add the others because they stood for exactly the same principles as Reagan.

We stand for freedom.

We stand for abundance.

We stand for individual responsibility.

Freedom. Abundance and Responsibility. That is our platform.

Those who call that “nothing” are the same failed leaders who disdained it during the Reagan years and dismantled it as soon as the Reagan years were over. They stand for statism. We stand for freedom: The God-given right to enjoy the fruit of our own labor; the right to raise our children according to our own values; the right to express our opinions and our faith freely and without reserve; the right to defend ourselves and our families; the right to enter into voluntary associations with each other for our mutual betterment without an army of busy-bodies telling us what is best for us.

They stand for the rationing of shortage. We stand for abundance: what happens when free men and free women enjoy the liberty to go as far as their desire, talent and imagination can guide them and as far as their labor, industry and enterprise can take them. Societies prosper when freedom protects the rights of each of us to decide on our own what we will produce and what we will consume. Government exists to protect the conditions that produce abundance, not to ration shortages that government has caused.

They stand for paternalism. We stand for personal responsibility. That means you stand by your promises. That means you tell your customers the truth about your products and investments. It means if you bring a child into the world then by God you look after that child. And it means if you make a bad decision, you set it right and you learn from it – and you realize that the bad decisions we all make from time to time is the price we pay for the freedom to make all the good decisions in our lives.

Freedom. Abundance. Responsibility. Ladies and Gentlemen, that ain’t “nothing.” That’s everything.

That’s everything our country is, everything our country stands for. That’s everything ten generations of Americans have fought to defend. That is everything that the happiness and prosperity of society depends upon. That is everything that we have – everything that we are – everything that we hope as Americans.

Jefferson called it the “sum of good government” which he described as “a wise and frugal Government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned.”

At the risk of politically incorrect nostalgia, nine years before he became Governor of California, Reagan put it this way during a commencement address to his alma mater. He said, “This is a simple struggle between those of us who believe that man has the dignity and sacred right and the ability to choose and shape his own destiny and those who do not so believe. This irreconcilable conflict is between those who believe in the sanctity of individual freedom and those who believe in the supremacy of the state.”

Lincoln said much the same. He said, “That is the real issue. That is the issue that will continue in this country when these poor tongues of Judge Douglas and myself shall be silent. It is the eternal struggle between these two principles – right and wrong – throughout the world. They are the two principles that have stood face to face from the beginning of time; and will ever continue to struggle. The one is the common right of humanity, and the other is the divine right of kings. It is the same principle in whatever shape it develops itself. It is the same spirit that says, ‘You work and toil and earn bread, and I’ll eat it.’ No matter in what shape it comes, whether from the mouth of a king who seeks to bestride the people of his own nation and live by the fruit of their labor, or from one race of men as an apology for enslaving another race, it is the same tyrannical principle.”

And today, our country faces this tyrannical principle in actual practice.

The Left would condemn our children to the failure of government schools run by teacher unions. We would liberate parents to select the school and the teacher that best meets their child’s needs and hold the school and the teacher accountable for the results.

The Left would condemn our families to sky-high energy prices; we would free America’s vast energy reserves and limitless supplies of clean, cheap electricity through nuclear power, hydro-electricity and clean coal.

The Left would condemn our health care to bureaucrats who’ll decide what treatments we may have and when we may have them. We would provide the tax credits to bring a basic health plan within the financial reach of every family – a health plan they could chose, they could own, and they could change if it failed to serve them.

The Left would deny union members the right to a secret ballot; we would free employers to pay bonuses to union members above and beyond their union contract.

The Left would plunder our children of their prosperity tomorrow to pay for the unprecedented expansion of government today. We insist on a government that does what families do every day: work hard, waste not and live within our means. And that promise needs to begin with renouncing the failed Bush administration that violated every one of these tenets.

The Left offers stifling central planning to manage every aspect of our lives; they offer higher and higher taxes and more and more costly regulations. We offer freedom.

It’s ironic that the same rocket scientists who say we have to listen more to the opposition’s message obviously haven’t been listening to our own.

We have the most powerful message in the history of mankind. It is freedom. And to those who say we have no messengers – look around at each other. Yes, Ronald Reagan was a great communicator, but as William Saracino has said, “He wasn’t communicating cookie recipes.” And if we learned anything at all from that great man, it was that every one of us needs to be a messenger.

In February of 1861, Abraham Lincoln’s inaugural train paused in Indianapolis and he spoke these words: “Of the people when they rise in mass on behalf of the Union and the liberties of their country, it may be said ‘The gates of hell shall not prevail against them. I appeal to you constantly to bear in mind that not with the President, not with the office-seekers, but with you is the question, ‘Shall the liberties of this country be preserved to the latest generation.’”

That is our clarion call. Ladies and Gentlemen, what has happened to our nation has happened on our generation’s watch, and it is our generation’s responsibility to set things right.

Does anyone here have any doubt how this battle will end as long as we stand firm? I think the Left is starting to figure that out too, and behind the smarmy smirks of superiority, their real sentiments are showing through.

The Department of Homeland Security refuses to use the word “terrorist” to describe Al Qaeda. It has replaced the term “acts of terrorism” with the term “man-made disaster” so as not to offend Islamic extremists. But it doesn’t hesitate to declare every American who believes in Constitutional principles or who defended those principles on far off battlefields as “potential domestic terrorists.”

That offers real insight into the Left. Churchill put it this way: “They are afraid of words and thoughts. Words spoken abroad, thoughts stirring at home – all the more powerful because forbidden – terrify them. A little mouse – a little tiny mouse – of thought enters the room and these mighty potentates are thrown into panic. They make frantic efforts to bar out thoughts and words; they are afraid of the workings of the human mind.”

Think about what terrifies the Left. Letters to the editor. Calls to talk shows. Blogs on the internet. Comments after newspaper editorials. Taxpayer tea parties.

Why did they react so viscously to the tea parties? You remember the tale of the “Emperor’s New Clothes” – once the townspeople realized that there were many others who believed as they believed, the façade collapsed.

So let’s not disappoint our friends on the left. Let us all here today resolve that we’re going to spend at least ten hours a week agitating and educating in every forum we can find.

When the American Founders adopted the Declaration of Independence, they pledged to each other their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor. They were speaking quite literally. When they pledged their lives, they meant it. The King had already warned that a noose awaited every one of them. When they pledged their fortunes, they meant it. Lewis Morris had just received word that his estate in New York had been burned to the ground, that his family had become refugees and that his two sons had enlisted in the rag-tag army around General Washington.

How little history demands of our generation in defense of those same principles. We aren’t asked to pledge our entire fortunes – just a small portion of our earnings in support of the causes and candidates we believe in. We aren’t asked to pledge our lives – only a small portion of our lives until we have set things right.

But our sacred honor – that history demands of us in full. That we leave today highly resolved not to fail or falter until we have restored freedom as the cornerstone of our government. Because if we fail to do that, then what history will demand of our children and grandchildren is unthinkable.

So let us honor the memory of Reagan and Lincoln and Jefferson and all those placed freedom above security and principle above politics. To those among us who would do otherwise, as Shakespeare said, “He who hath no stomach for this fight, let him now depart.”

And then let us together write the next chapter of the American Republic: that just when it appeared that the principles of American freedom were faltering, this generation rediscovered them, rallied to them, revived them, restored them, polished them and passed them on shining and inviolate to the many succeeding generations that followed.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Editor’s Comments: McClintock 2012.  This is one Republican that gets it in the true spirit of Ronald Reagan.

Sunday, May 17, 2009

Update: Fascism Comes To Notre Dame

This morning I still struggle to find the words to describe the feelings I felt watching Father Weslin’s arrest at Notre Dame yesterday, as he protested Barack Hussein Obama’s Commencement Ceremony appearance.

culture of death

Perhaps I should start by stating that in all my years never would I have given so much as a second’s worth of thought that a Catholic Priest, acting in conscience for one of the most basic, fundamental teachings of the Catholic Church would ever be arrested at a “Catholic” University for standing up for one of the Catholic Church’s most basic and fundamental teachings: respect for the sanctity and dignity of human life.  Yet, that’s precisely what happened yesterday at Notre Dame University to Father Weslin.  

Obama as we know is the most liberal, pro-abortion President in the history of the United States of America.  Notre Dame’s invitation to him as the Commencement Speaker has been very controversial amongst Catholics and Christian’s alike in the last several months.  Notre Dame up until yesterday was considered one of the cradles of Catholicism in the country. 

Not any longer.

Father John Jenkins, Notre Dame Board Chairman who ultimately approved and endorsed the Obama invitation has cost Notre Dame its credibility.  By inviting Obama, a steadfast pro-abortion President, Jenkins sends a conflicting message to Catholics about the issue of abortion.  Catholic doctrine on this issue is clear, condemning abortion as a grave evil.  Christian writers from the first-century author of the Didache to Pope John Paul II in his encyclical Evangelium Vitae ("The Gospel of Life") have maintained that the Bible forbids abortion, just as it forbids murder.

 abortionbillboard

In 1995 Pope John Paul II declared that the Church’s teaching on abortion "is unchanged and unchangeable. Therefore, by the authority which Christ conferred upon Peter and his successors . . . “I declare that direct abortion, that is, abortion willed as an end or as a means, always constitutes a grave moral disorder, since it is the deliberate killing of an innocent human being. This doctrine is based upon the natural law and upon the written word of God, is transmitted by the Church’s tradition and taught by the ordinary and universal magisterium. No circumstance, no purpose, no law whatsoever can ever make licit an act which is intrinsically illicit, since it is contrary to the law of God which is written in every human heart, knowable by reason itself, and proclaimed by the Church" (Evangelium Vitae 62).

NotreDameTorture

In inviting, and allowing Obama to give the Commencement address at today’s Graduation ceremonies at Notre Dame, Father John Jenkins is directly violating a fundamental Catholic Church teaching, a directive by the late Pope John Paul II himself, and engaging a mortal enemy of the teachings of the Catholic Church itself – Barack Hussein Obama. 

Let’s be honest for a moment.  The debate over abortion is not about using sweet cover-up words like “choice” or  “reproductive health.”  The debate over abortion is really about the killAntiabortion-ExcusemeAmericathisisting of innocent human beings in the womb.  It’s about blood, guts and murder.  Father Jenkins, what part of “Thou Shall Not Commit Murder” do you not understand?

As the Board of Notre Dame has endorsed Father John Jenkin’s decision to allow Barack Hussein Obama to deliver the commencement address, Notre Dame has itself demonstrated it is corrupted, and is no longer a University in the “Catholic Tradition.”

In closing, I’d like to offer up one final thought. 

The arrests of Father Weslin and others at Notre Dame yesterday made me pause to think and research if there were any such arrests during the Bush Administration on college campuses or elsewhere as Bush delivered  Commencement or other addresses in a public forum.

We’d heard for eight years that American’s were losing their rights under the Bush Administration on a daily basis.  Yet, I couldn’t find a single example of those claims.  (The closest the Bush haters could come is to point to Guantanamo Bay, however not a single American is held there.)

Nowhere in the public record could I find a single instance of a Bush hater being arrested for … protesting.  In fact, quite the opposite was true. 

Cindy Sheehan camped out at “Camp Casey” with a number of other anti-war protesters directly outside the prairie Chapel Ranch in Crawford Texas, as President Bush vacationed at his Crawford Ranch in 2005. 

Not a single arrest was recorded as a result, and in fact a local property owner with closer proximity to the Bush family ranch allowed Sheehan and her merry band of miscreants to move onto his property to conduct their protests in an attempt to disrupt the Bush family’s vacation – on their own property.

Now, we know that not a single protester was ever arrested on a College Campus while Bush gave a commencement address for if there was one, media accounts of the arrests would be readily available on the internet!  Considering the ‘mainstream media’ was not exactly friendly to the Bush administration, a single arrest would’ve been subject of media scrutiny for weeks had one happened.  Clearly one did not.

Yet, here we have the ‘mainstream media’ once again demonstrating their complicity in not reporting the Obama Administration’s egregious violations of basic Constitutional protections: FREE SPEECH in having civil, non-violent protesters who simply disagree with the current President’s stance on abortion arrested.

This is FASCISM in America, where dissent is no longer tolerated.  Apparently when Hillary Clinton declared “dissent is patriotic!” she meant free speech only for thee, and not for ME.

Today’s liberals are the FASCISTS of the 1930’s and 1940’s, and if we all remember world history then we know what happened last time a FASCIST was appeased and allowed to run wild.

The time to take a stand is NOW.  Will you stand?

Other Blogs of note on this topic:

Jill Stanek – Pro Life Pulse

Notre Dame Protest

Mary Ann Glendon Declines Laetare Medal (Notre Dame’s Highest Honor)

Saturday, May 16, 2009

Fascism Comes to Notre Dame

This video really requires no introduction, other than to say look at what Notre Dame is doing, all for the sake of having the most liberal, pro-abortion “President” in the history of the country speak at their graduation ceremony.

This is fascism in America.  When free speech means arresting an 80 year old defenseless Catholic Priest who has the AUDACITY to speak out against abortion at a CATHOLIC University that is supposed to stand up for LIFE, and the CATHOLIC TRADITION of protecting the unborn, surely we are bearing witness to the corruption of the University of Notre Dame, and Fascism coming to America.

I'm simply horrified at what this country is rapidly becoming under the most liberal, pro-abortion "President" this country has ever seen.

Those who claim to be "Pro-Life" and "Pro-Obama" in the Catholic Faith should be shunned. You are true hypocrites! culture of death

Handcuffing an 80 year old Pri est? This is FASCISM folks, compliments of the Obama administration.  Dissent will not be tolerated by this “President.”

God Bless Father Weslin, a true man of what God calls us all to do!

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Anti-Union Backlash, Banks Resist Funding Companies With Large Union Presence

Unions may think they’re the big winners in the Chrysler bankruptcy as a result of the Obama Administration’s bullying of preferred debt holders, but the reality is many banks are re-thinking how they will finance companies with a large Union organization in the future. 

Many investment bankers and bankruptcy experts are deeply worried about the precedent set by the Obama Administration’s preferential treatment of Chrysler’s unions at the expense of Chrysler’s secured debt holders last week.  Under contract law, secure debt holders are first in line to be paid back during bankruptcy proceedings.  The Obama Administration’s bullying and threatening of several large secure debt holders has many investors, investment banks and other financing arms seriously reconsidering whether or not they’ll provide capital to companies with unions in the future.

The Obama Administration’s bullying sends a clear signal that this left-wing liberal President will intervene on behalf of Union interests in the economy, as much as they feel like.  “If you think the government will continue to intervene in the economy as much as they have an appetite to, and they’re going to come down on the side of the unions, then you’re going to be careful about getting involved with those companies,” one bankruptcy expert said.”

With the impending bankruptcy filing of General Motors (now “Government Motors”) in early June, Wall Street is closely watching how secure debt holders at GM and other bondholders are going to be treated by this Administration.  After witnessing the bullying tactics exercised on Chrysler’s debt holders, GM’s investors may very well prefer to take their chances in bankruptcy court rather than accept the Obama Administration’s offer of five cents on the dollar for their debt.

How bad is it for GM?  Their term loan lost seven points of value in just two trading sessions last week, after the Obama Administration bullied Chrysler.   That sends a very bad signal for GM’s prospects to emerge quickly from any forced bankruptcy filing.

“It’s not a fair fight when they have all the money and all the guns,” one banker said about the government. “It’s very limited what we can do because we can get dragged through the press if we don’t cave to whatever outcome they (the Obama Administration) thinks is right.”

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Editorial Note: My 2003 GMC Envoy Denali SUV is the very last vehicle I will *ever* buy from General Motors as a result of their accepting Government Bailout money via my hard earned tax dollars.  GM should learn to build what the public wants, not what the Government demands.  Inasmuch as Obama fired GM’s CEO and is now running the company, GM deserves what they get from this point forward. 

As the UAW is now the major shareholder of Chrysler, be careful what you wish for UAW, you just may get it.

Sunday, May 10, 2009

Suddenly, Dissent Is No Longer Quite So Patriotic

Taylor Armerding

The Eagle-Tribune Online

What a difference an inauguration makes.

It was only a few months ago that "dissent is the highest form of patriotism" was still the rage among the elite, liberal, "tolerant" class.

But then Barack Obama became president. And now, suddenly, baobm dissenters are paranoid, violent extremists worthy of surveillance by the federal Department of Homeland Security. Returning war veterans, who tend to be conservative and believe that terrorists ought to be called terrorists, need to be watched.

Average working Americans who held polite "Tea Party" protests on April 15 against confiscatory taxes and rampant government spending — protests marked by a lack of broken windows, overturned cars, torched buildings and injuries — are mocked with a not-so-veiled reference to a gay sex act. Conservative television and radio commentators are not only crazed nutcases, they are dangerous purveyors of hate and violence, unlike the civil, issue-oriented discourse of Keith Olbermann and Bill Maher.

Suddenly, there is no tolerance for dissent. It is tantamount to treason.freespeechsmallnh4

It was only a few months ago that blocking every element of President Bush's agenda was tops on the elites' list of good things to do. Wanting him to fail was a very good thing, whether it was his effort to stabilize Social Security by giving individuals more responsibility and control of it or winning a war. It didn't matter if the Democrats didn't have a constructive alternative. Blocking Bush was enough — the highest form of political responsibility.

Then Obama became president. And suddenly any opposition to the president's agenda is not worthy of substantive debate or discussion. It is simply a very bad thing, to be dismissed with a label: The Party of No. Wanting his vast expansion of government authority and spending to fail is hateful and divisive.

It was only a few months ago that the only way to have any street cred as an elite was to throw something like "BushHitler" into your conversation. Even better was to call the president an idiot, insane, incompetent and/or a swaggering cowboy.

Then Obama became president. Suddenly, "swagga" is a very cool thing. What is not cool is to suggest that the president's agenda is leading us on a path to socialism. Or to suggest that he may not be as brilliant as the adoring press makes him out to be, since he can't seem to go anywhere or say much of anything without a teleprompter. Those are ugly political smears. Not cool at all.

It was a few years ago, when President Bush was nominating a justice for the Supreme Court, that I heard frenzied liberal elites on National Public Radio warning of the horror of one party holding the presidency and a majority in Congress, and therefore being able to appoint justices to the Supreme Court. It was all so unfair, they wailed.

Then the Democrats took Congress. Then Obama got elected. And now there are no wails of anguish, only celebration among the elites, at the prospect of one party controlling all three branches of government.

Only a few months ago, if a presidential 747 airliner had buzzed 139936 Manhattan for a photo shoot, coming within 1,500 feet of some of the buildings, there would have been a media feeding frenzy for the blood of President Bush. The words "arrogant" and "jerk" would have been the gentler labels. The story would have played for weeks, minimum. There is no way the press would have stood by meekly while the White House issued a perfunctory apology, prodded a single aide to fall on his sword, refused to say who was on the plane or released only one of the photos — shot for publicity purposes.

But Obama is the president. So while there was a flurry of criticism from those quickly labeled the "right-wing hate machine," it was a one- or two-day story at most for the mainstream media. Move along. Nothing to see here. Have you heard how fantastically the administration has been handling the swine — uh, I mean the H1N1 — flu crisis?

Until a few months ago, any elite conversation about President Bush had to include a standard line about him "shredding the Constitution."

But now Obama is president. And when asked what standard he will apply when nominating a successor to retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter, the president said he wanted someone who "understands that justice isn't about some abstract legal theory or footnote in a casebook; it is also about how our laws affect the daily reality of people's lives, whether they can make a living and care for their families, whether they feel safe in their homes and welcome in their own nation."

Not a word about how judges are supposed to be blind to personal circumstance. Not a word about the Constitution. I guess we won't have to worry about the administration or the court shredding the Constitution, because there is no Constitution to shred.

It is fine, when a new president takes office, for the agenda to change, and reflect the philosophy of his party. Not so fine for the standards and rules for judging an administration to take a 180-degree turn.HUGH-OBAMA-FRIENDS

Not the kind of change I'm believing in.

Saturday, May 2, 2009

White House Directly Threatens Chrysler Investors

A Tyrant By Any Other Name, Is Still A Tyrant

When the sitting President of the United States of America threatens to bring the “full force of the White House Press Corp” to bear, to destroy the reputations of the investors of a Corporation in order to get what the White House wants, what does that say?

It says a tyrant by any other name, is still a tyrant.

Auto Industry.  Health Care Industry. Banking.  Credit Cards.

Where does this stop?

How far will this Socialist, borderline Marxist go to get “his way?”

The liberal lamestream media is so far in the tank for Obama that he earnestly believes he can use them as a threat against his enemies?

Now, if this were the Bush administration, this story and the attached audio would be all over the evening news.  Look at the media’s reaction to “waterboarding” … as if it was even really torture at all!!

But this is Obama, the media’s darling boy.  And as Obama says “I won.”

Listen for yourselves as Attorney Tom Lauria, the attorney of record for Chrysler Corporation guaranteed debt holders describes being threatened by the White House:

Obama voters, is this the “Change” you voted for, Government seizure of Publicly held corporations and the destruction of wealth and contract law in the United States?

If so, be careful what you wish for, you may just be on the receiving end yourselves when Republicans regain the White House.  The political pendulum swings both ways you know.