Appropriate Placard Slogans for the Objectivist "Wing" of the Tea Party Movement

[galtgulch]

<<<" the nature of the proper governmental services must be constitutionally defined and delimited, leaving the government no power to enlarge the scope of its services at its own arbitrary discretion. ">>>

Peter,

This was accomplished once, as we all know, by the writers of the Constitution, in Article 1 Section 8, the so called "enumerated powers." The last clause of which said that the Congress shall have the power to pass any and all laws, 'necessary and proper' to implement the forementioned powers.

As I have learned recently Alexander Hamilton persuaded President Washington at the get go that it was in the interest of the country for there to be created a central bank. When Washington questioned the Constitutionality of such, Hamilton replied that it was an "implied power."

Ever since the Supreme Court has ruled that the Congress would be the entity which would decide which powers were in the best interest of the country.

It is about time that the electorate understood this issue as a first step in reducing the Federal government back down to its limited and enumerated powers and that the Federal Reserve System, for one thing, be abolished once and for all.

www.campaignforliberty.com 228,143

[Peter]

TIA Daily • February 22, 2010

FEATURE ARTICLE

McVeighing Against the Tea Parties

The Left Evades Its Own Moral Collapse by Smearing the Right

by Robert Tracinski

After months of virtually ignoring the biggest new factor in American politics, the New York Times has finally decided to publish a long profile on the Tea Party movement—but only so they can launch a dishonest smear campaign against it.

The whole essence of the article is to portray the Tea Parties as hotbeds of crazy conspiracy theories promoted by anarchist militias connected to racist groups. The message is that the Tea Party movement is not connected to traditional Republican politics—which is quite true—but to something the New York Times calls the "Patriot movement." Now, I thought that we all believed ourselves to be patriots acting out of love for our country and its founding principles. But what the Times reporter means by "Patriots" is a quasi-anarchist, quasi-racist militia movement of survivalists preparing for armed insurrection against the federal government.

The innuendo is laid on particularly thick in the second half of the article, which cites "civil rights activists"—an honorific only given to leftists—who "could not help but wonder why the explosion of conservative anger coincided with a series of violent acts by right wing extremists" and "a puzzling return of racist rhetoric and violence." To give an idea of the intellectual standards at the New York Times these days, the article goes on to admit that "Mr. Stewart said it would be unfair to attribute any of these incidents to the Tea Party movement. 'We don’t have any evidence they are connected,' he said. Still, he sees troubling parallels." So this is a self-confessed argument from innuendo and conjecture, backed by no actual evidence.

All of this is allegedly based on "interviews conducted across the country over several months"—but it is mostly based on one Tea Party group in Idaho. This is not the epicenter of the Tea Party movement; the movement's epicenter is in congressional districts that are much more evenly divided between left and right, where the Tea Party groups actually represent a change in the prevailing political culture. So why did the New York Times send its reporter to Sandpoint, Idaho? Because of "a legacy of anti-government activism in northern Idaho. Outside Sandpoint, federal agents laid siege to Randy Weaver’s compound on Ruby Ridge in 1992…. To the south, Richard Butler, leader of the Aryan Nations, preached white separatism from a compound near Coeur d’Alene until he was shut down." In other words, they picked the location most likely to give them material for the story they wanted to report.

Others in the mainstream media have picked up this new party line, with less subtlety. At the Washington Post, Jonathan Capehart makes explicit exactly what this smear tactic is meant to achieve.

In the 1990s, there was lots of talk about the excesses of government power, a UN-run New World Order, and black helicopters on which the federal government would swoop in to take away Americans' freedom and money…. The distrust and seething hatred of the federal government took murderous form on April 19, 1995, when Timothy McVeigh…used the Waco anniversary to detonate a 4,800-pound truck bomb, destroying the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City and killing 168 people and injuring 500 others.

The left really, really wants this to be 1995 again. They want to be able to portray opponents of vastly expanded government control as if they are opponents of government as such, as if they are wild-eyed anarchists plotting to blow up buildings.

That's how they blunted the force of the last voter rebellion against big government, the "Republican Revolution" in 1994. They tried to associate the Republicans tangentially with a small "militia movement" of anarchist nuts who had pretensions of organizing their own private armies. The militias, in turn, were tangentially associated with a white supremacist, McVeigh, who blew up a government building. By this preposterous chain of guilt by association, the left tried to frame Rush Limbaugh and Newt Gingrich—an establishment Republican who is dismissed by many pro-free-marketers, with some justification, as an advocate of big government—as being somehow responsible for the Oklahoma City bombing.

This is the whole point of the New York Times piece: to resurrect that old slander from fifteen years ago. The idea is to connect the Republicans to the Tea Party movement, and the Tea Party movement to a much smaller group of conspiracy theorists and militia types—and in effect, to make Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck look like political front-men for white supremacists.

The left is working from a very old playbook in which they offer us only two alternatives: communism or fascism. So if you aren't a socialist, then you must be a racist. In its current variant, the false alternative we're offered is socialism versus anarchism. If you are against a government that runs everything—the banks, the automakers, the health-care system—then you must be against government as such.

This is why the left-leaning media is also trying to exploit the story of Joseph Stack, the disgruntled engineer who crashed his single-engine airplane into an IRS office. At the Washington Post, Jonathan Capehart is on the job again, sniping that Stack's "alienation is similar to that we're hearing from the extreme elements of the Tea Party," while a comment at New York magazine declares that "a lot of his rhetoric could have been taken directly from a handwritten sign at a Tea Party rally."

Oh, really? Stack's actual suicide note/manifesto inveighs against the "greed" of capitalism and complains that "the joke we call the American medical system, including the drug and insurance companies, are murdering tens of thousands of people a year and stealing from the corpses and victims they cripple, and this country's leaders don't see that as important as bailing out a few of their vile, rich cronies…. It's clear they see no crisis as long as the dead people don't get in the way of their corporate profits rolling in." So Stack was mad that Congress failed to pass ObamaCare—not exactly a Tea Party sentiment. In fact, he sounds a lot more like Alan Grayson than Glenn Beck.

Capehart gives the whole game away with this passage, which contains the essence of the guilt by association he is attempting to set up: "When was Oath Keepers"—a group the Times story associates with the militias—"formed? April 19, 2009. The same day the Revolutionary War began in 1775. The same day the Branch Davidian compound burned to the ground in 1993. The same day as the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995." So if you want to commemorate the American Revolution and the Founding Fathers by celebrating April 19—then that automatically makes you a racist militia conspiracy theorist.

This smear is so crude that it long ago ceased to be convincing. Forty years ago, Ayn Rand dismissed it as an "old saw of pre-World War II vintage" and named its purpose: to offer us a choice of "a dictatorship of the left or of an alleged right—with the possibility of a free society, of capitalism, dismissed and obliterated, as if it never existed."

And that what all the stuff in the New York Times about conspiracy theories and militias is meant to accomplish. It is meant to divert our attention from other details that the reporter felt he has to include but doesn't want us to notice: the fact that, under the influence of Glenn Beck, Tea Party supporters have "explored the Federalist Papers, exposés on the Federal Reserve, the work of Ayn Rand and George Orwell." And it gets worse: "Some went to constitutional seminars," while others are "studying the Constitution line by line" and like to "recite lines from the Declaration of Independence." How scary!

What the New York Times doesn't want us to notice is that the Tea Party movement is not about guns and conspiracy theories—it is actually about books and study groups. It is, in part, an intellectual revival of the pro-free-market right, influenced by the ideals of America's Founders.

The left wants to evade this fact in order to avoid facing up to its own ideological bankruptcy. If the Tea Party movement has the Founding Fathers and Ayn Rand to look to as ideological influences, what does the left have? Marxism failed with the fall of the Berlin Wall two decades ago, and Climategate is currently doing to environmentalism what the fall of the wall did to Marxism. This means that the left now has nothing to stand on, ideologically speaking.

In this respect, there is one point in the New York Times report that rings true. What does connect the Tea Party movement with some strains of the militias and conspiracy theorists is "a narrative of impending tyranny." And as one quasi-militia activist tells the Times, "People are more willing, he said, to imagine a government that would lock up political opponents, or ration health care with 'death panels,' or fake global warming. And if global warming is a fraud, is it so crazy to wonder about a president’s birth certificate? 'People just do not trust any of this,' Mr. Mack said."

The real story here is not about the Tea Party movement; it's about the left. The ruling political clique in Washington has suffered a catastrophic loss of moral legitimacy—just at the point when they have been seeking a rapid and far-reaching expansion of their power over our lives. This has led a significant portion of the public to conclude that the real essence of the left's agenda is a lust for power and control. And so a whole series of ideological groups—from Bilderberg conspiracy theorists to students of Ayn Rand and the Federalist Papers—have risen up in response to this dangerous vacuum of moral legitimacy.

And so the left has to seize on the existence of one of these groups, the racists and conspiracy theorists, in order to deny the existence of the real intellectual alternative: the Ayn-Rand-Federalist-Papers wing of the Tea Party phenomenon.

They have to do it to avoid acknowledging that it is the left that has run out of valid ideas, while it is the right that is bubbling with a new ideological ferment—and therefore owns the future.

One-Year Subscription — $74

Six-Month Subscription — $38

Subscribe now!

[Peter]

Galtgulch wrote:

As I have learned recently Alexander Hamilton persuaded President Washington at the get go that it was in the interest of the country for there to be created a central bank. When Washington questioned the Constitutionality of such, Hamilton replied that it was an "implied power."

Ever since the Supreme Court has ruled that the Congress would be the entity which would decide which powers were in the best interest of the country.

It is about time that the electorate understood this issue as a first step in reducing the Federal government back down to its limited and enumerated powers and that the Federal Reserve System, for one thing, be abolished once and for all.

End quote

As noted on another thread, the 1936 Supreme Court decision "United States v. Butler" needs to be reworked by the Supreme Court, but with its current constituency that likelihood is low. The “General Welfare Clause” needs to be modified by, dare I say it, by a carefully scripted Constitutional Convention.

Also we need to look at test cases making there way to the Supremes utilizing the 9th and 10th amendments.

The Ninth Amendment:

"The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

The Tenth Amendment:

“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

I remember Rush suggesting contacting the Heritage Foundation to help with test cases.

It is the Supreme Court’s *altering the meaning* of the words written there, or their *adverse interpretation* of the words written there, that is ONE OF the causes of our loss of liberty.

And the other cause is the Constitution itself.

So how do we change things? Twenty or thirty years of *good Presidents* could appoint enough judges who are receptive to a strict interpretation.

Or we could have a predominantly, future Tea Party elected Congress enact laws that require a strict interpretation.

Or get a further amendment passed. Will the people reading this on OL write a sample amendment?

.

The last amendment is the 27th, ratified May 5, 1992:

“No law, varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of Representatives shall have intervened.”

To show how difficult it is to pass an amendment, the 27th was first proposed in 1789.

In spite of recent Tea Party gains, consider the current political climate in the Welfare States like New York, New Jersey, and California, and the prevailing entitlement mentality of many Americans.

As I mentioned, I am fearful of a Constitutional Convention UNLESS it had a strictly defined *script* and our representatives at the convention were men of honor. Is that possible? Does the checkered history of the first Convention show us the way to safely proceed?

Semper cogitans fidele,

Peter Taylor

[Peter]

ValueChaser John wrote:

I have drawn some implications from what I believe you mean by this, but before I post them, I want to make sure I understand their basis. Would you give an example or definition of Rand's "'hard to actualize' radical rhetoric" and her mature "practical reality"? (I am taking your context as: the privatization of moral governmental functions is what she first regarded as "hard to actualize," before she spoke of it in terms of "practical reality")

End quote

Precisely, though my pre-morning-coffee brain was thinking more in general terms of the sweep of Randian history. Back in the mid-sixties I “estimate” Rand’s personae and the personae of a mature Ron Paul’s anti-interventionism, overlapping if not converging. She was against the Viet Nam War because it was not in our national interest, but she was for nuking Russia. When I learned about her Anti-Vietnam war stance, I was in Army basic training, and detected a practical but not philosophical pacifism. Americans were dying for nothing.

Sorry, I have meager other examples to illustrate. And for an Objectivist feelings don’t count as proof, only as intuition, and I don’t feel like thumbing through “The Anti-Conceptual Mentality,” but that title triggers a memory.

Later Rand put more emphasis on international intervention. She specifically said at some point that it was morally right for a “Free” country to invade or destroy an “Unfree” country. She may have always held this view but a mature Rand, if she were an advisor to the President might be more likely to advise a President Romney to take out Fidel and Raul Castro.

Could a strong military defeat or “stalemate” the remnants of the Soviet Empire, a bubbling Communist China, or defeat the Hated Islamic Fascists, without mandatory taxation?

Just glance over this once more. From the Ayn Rand Lexicon:

Taxation

In a fully free society, taxation—or, to be exact, payment for governmental services—would be voluntary. Since the proper services of a government—the police, the armed forces, the law courts—are demonstrably needed by individual citizens and affect their interests directly, the citizens would (and should) be willing to pay for such services, as they pay for insurance.

The question of how to implement the principle of voluntary government financing—how to determine the best means of applying it in practice—is a very complex one and belongs to the field of the philosophy of law. The task of political philosophy is only to establish the nature of the principle and to demonstrate that it is practicable. The choice of a specific method of implementation is more than premature today—since the principle will be practicable only in a fully free society, a society whose government has been constitutionally reduced to its proper, basic functions.

Any program of voluntary government financing has to be regarded as a goal for a distant future.

What the advocates of a fully free society have to know, at present, is only the principle by which that goal can be achieved.

The principle of voluntary government financing rests on the following premises: that the government is not the owner of the citizens’ income and, therefore, cannot hold a blank check on that income—that the nature of the proper governmental services must be constitutionally defined and delimited, leaving the government no power to enlarge the scope of its services at its own arbitrary discretion. Consequently, the principle of voluntary government financing regards the government as the servant, not the ruler, of the citizens—as an agent who must be paid for his services, not as a benefactor whose services are gratuitous, who dispenses something for nothing.

End quote

I think most if not all of this was quoted from “The Virtue of Selfishness,” but Binswanger and Peikoff had their thumbs in it.

Notice the waffling between an Idealist and a Realist:

From: “In a fully free society, taxation—or, to be exact, payment for governmental services—would be voluntary.”

Verses: “. . . the citizens would (and should) be willing to pay for such services, as they pay for insurance.”

From: “The task of political philosophy is only to establish the nature of the principle and to demonstrate that it is practicable.”

Verses: “The choice of a specific method of implementation is more than premature today—since the principle will be practicable only in a fully free society . . .”

Her mature view is lacking in Absolutism and Thomas Paine’s stinging rhetorical style as seen in Roark’s or Galt’s speeches.

An aside:

I went back and looked at Binswanger’s article “Libertarianism” before I wrote this. It is astonishing how a lack of requirements for values in the Libertarian platform opened the way for Marxism to permeate the movement. All you needed to do to be a libertarian was to renounce the initiation of force. So there were anti-capitalist commune -ists, Fascist, and Communist Libertarians represented at the conventions. And that quote from Mr Rothbard is beyond contempt. I would have nothing to do with that dirt bag if he were alive today. Read it to feel outrage.

The small “ell” libertarian movement I see today is not the same one as back then. Am I wrong? It more resembles the Tea Party Movement. Does anyone have any familiarity with the big “ELL” Libertarian Party? What sort of reprobates show up there?

John wrote:

That is why I am thinking that a system of voluntary insurance PLUS compulsory taxation of a thief, mugger, or any one of a bevy of rights-abrogators should be forced to "insure" (in proportionate measure) the very police system that the victim chose not to pay for.

End quote

Ingenious but is it practical? How many thieves are wealthy or can be counted on to pay their taxes or fines?

John wrote:

Well, a certain percentages of wrongdoers will be able to pay. To those who can't pay . . . This is a case that would seem to be rare; a very small percentage of cases would involve BOTH a poor criminal AND an uninsured, would-be victim. In such cases, I believe a legal argument could be made that the police have the right to indebt the uninsured person for a particular case of such intervention . . .”

End quote

I don’t like that idea at all. It smacks to much of Obamacare. If the young don’t want medical insurance, that’s tough. Make insurance mandatory. If they show up at an emergency room with no money or insurance a hospital is still required to accept them. By law. And a doctor’s oath may also affect the physicians decision to treat the poor in an emergency.

So if a person without insurance is mugged, and the thief will not pay, the victim must hold a cold compress to the knot on his head and pay for services rendered? That thought might keep people away from Mardi Gras 8-)

Semper cogitans fidele,

A mature Peter Taylor

[Peter]

Rush synopsis from 12:30:

We should not support personalities. At this time. And not necessarily every Republican. We support the Town Halls and the Tea Party Movement, however we are not ready to give up on the Republicans.

If you on the far right, who are mad at Mitt Romney for endorsing McCain, can produce a third party savior, show me the money. We want to elect an opposition to Obama, no matter where they come from.

Rush went on to say Mitt’s support of John was Machiavellian. McCain will probably lose the nomination or election but as senior spokesperson, and former Presidential candidate he will be throwing zingers. So, Mitt was preempting himself as a target.

I figured out Value Chasers picture. He is the likeness of Julius Caesar on a gold coin.

Semper cogitans fidele,

Peter Taylor

[Selene]

Nice! lol

How did it go for ole Julie boy?

Adam

[9thdoctor]

How did it go for ole Julie boy?

Mmm, not so good.

[Selene]

How did it go for ole Julie boy?

Mmm, not so good.

Very nice!

This why I love batting second...so an all star hitter can rip one down the line and score...

Adam

[9thdoctor]

Very nice!

Well I've got some more where that came from!

[Peter]

Ninth Doctor and Adam Selene seem incapable of coming up with even a vaguely Objectivist placard slogan that would distinguish them from the crowd. Perhaps it is because they are indistinguishable and not Objectivists! How can two guys who speak in cartoons not come up with a great visual and verbal slogan against Fascism?

From the POLITICO

Obama's task:

One tune, five crowds

“. . . Obama’s revisions are aimed at bringing on board doubters on the left and the right. His proposal to reduce the excise tax is aimed both at the labor left, which reviles a tax that will affect union health plans, and at conservatives concerned about any middle-class tax hike. His plan to end a special deal for Nebraska could offer moderates a chance to claim they’d fought for and won a victory for transparency . . . .”

end quote

What a bunch of crap. When the bi-partisan panel convenes the Republicans should, at the most strategic point, get up and walk out, en masse.

Their spokesman should say, “We told the President that if he wants Health Reform, then here is the only two provisions that will pass. One: Major Tort Reform. Two: The ability to buy insurance across state lines. It will be on less than a dozen sheets of paper. We will post it on the internet before we vote on it. Is that agreeable, Mr. President? This will be the health bill you can claim as your own. After that is passed then we will look at *Coverage for people denied insurance for pre-existing conditions*.

Here’s a placard slogan: “It’s all over for the Progressive/Bull Moose Party.” (The Teddy Roosevelt Bull Moose Party was the start of the Progressive Movement according to Glenn Beck.)

How about: “The fall of the Roman Empire was preceded by bread and circuses. The Fall of the American Dream will be preceded by Intellectual and Fiscal Bankruptcy!”

That might be a bit long.

“Don’t tread on me,” with a picture of Biden (for a change) stepping on a snake with Lady Liberty’s face on one end, and Ronald Reagons face at the other end? And with no distinguishing who is on the tail end so as not to offend 8-)

Semper cogitans fidele,

Peter Taylor

[9thdoctor]

Ninth Doctor and Adam Selene seem incapable of coming up with even a vaguely Objectivist placard slogan that would distinguish them from the crowd. Perhaps it is because they are indistinguishable and not Objectivists! How can two guys who speak in cartoons not come up with a great visual and verbal slogan against Fascism?

When did I try? I disagree with John’s approach of trying to alieanate other people at a rally, though if the pro-life crowd come out in force, I think a pro-choice banner is called for. I expect the abortion debate to break the back of the Tea Party movement, though I’d like to be proven wrong on this point. If you’re looking to get people to read Rand, I think “Who is John Galt”, “Atlas is Shrugging” etc. are effective.

Peter, if you have a problem with light banter on an internet forum, don’t read my posts, or Adam’s. I mostly ignore yours, or skim them at best, as I explained in an attempt at constructive criticism on another thread. When the board index shows a new post by Peter Taylor, I don’t bother to click on it. I think Xray is the only other holder of this honor.

I don’t restrict myself to substantive comments, my attitude is that this is not a job, and ultimately it’s a diversion. I do try, however, to avoid causing thread drift. Otherwise, sharing a laugh is good. Except with Peter, where it’s neither good nor bad, but pointless.

[Peter]

The problem with any unwritten law is that you don't know where to go to erase it. -- Glaser and Way

Doctor wrote about my posts:

I mostly ignore yours, or skim them at best, as I explained in an attempt at constructive criticism on another thread.

end quote

Thank you fifth. That was a substantive answer.

Your idea that *abortion* could be the issue that keeps the Tea Party from becoming a cohesive monolith is also worth considering. That would be a shame. We need to keep the focus on a strict interpretation and fix of the Constitution.

Can you or does anyone else suggest a Tea Party site where this issue could be discussed. I went to one and they wanted you to fill out a poll that was moronic:

Do you agree that Obama’s policies are A) ok B) NOT OK C) VERY BAD D) IDIOTIC E) BORDERING ON CRIMINAL?

Now for the real reason I am writing Doctor. Why don’t snorers hear themselves snore?

Semper cogitans fidele,

Peter Taylor

[Selene]

Peter:

Your paradigm for analyzing the Tea Party movement is not valid. Apparently, you are seeking a central point of reference that speaks for the movement as a whole.

This movement has no centralized structure, no "leader" and is essentially unique in its formation.

One of the major reason that it strikes real fear into the souls of the politicians is that it:

1) is growing rapidly;

2) is not leader specific;

3) is not issue specific;*

4) is not centralized; and

5) does not have one website that speaks for the whole movement.

In essence, is is truly American and therefore scares the shit out of the power brokers because they can't kill it.

The overhand right at the end of the scene is a classic tight in body move where the left hand changes the torque of the body while removing a possible block of the overhand right cross! Beautiful.

*I am not sure that 9th's fear is probable that the "abortion" issue is as potent a distractor as he believes. However, if he is correct, it does not change anything.

http://www.youtube.c...h?v=zWyEc7FAMTg

The people rest.

Adam

wrapping torches and sharpening pitchforks

[Peter]

From the article below:

The persistence of cap-and-trade in the face of Climategate provides us with more evidence that the real essence of the left is a reactionary hatred of capitalism—which means: a hatred of affluence, a hatred of prosperous middle-class strivers . . .

End quote

I agree with Rush, that the republicans are better than the Democrats in general but Senators Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and John McCain have got to go. I would support a Tea Party candidate in their states even if it meant splitting the vote and a democrat winning.

Placard? “ Graham crackin’, McCain lackin,’ send ‘em packin’ ”

Semper cogitans fidele,

Peter Taylor

TIA Daily • February 21, 2010

FEATURE ARTICLE

What's It All About, Al Gore?

What's Left Without Global Warming?

by Robert Tracinski

With apologies to Dionne Warwick—and to Michael Caine, for that matter—I have to ask: What's it all about, Al Gore?

I mean all of this stuff about how we have to restructure our entire society to avoid man-made global warming—what was it all really about? Was it ever really about global warming? Or was it really about restructuring our society, for which global warming was just an excuse?

That's what we have to start asking in the wake of Climategate.

It is not just that Climategate—the e-mails leaked from the Climatic Research Unit at Britain's University of East Anglia, and the subsequent investigations they unleashed—has revealed that the "settled science" of global warming was riddled with errors, based on questionable data and false assumptions, and distorted by conformity, bullying, and groupthink.

It is not just that some of the main Climategate conspirators, such as the CRU's Phil Jones, are now admitting that the science isn't settled and that global temperatures may well have been warmer than today one thousand years ago, long before automobiles and industrial smokestacks.

No, what really ought to give us pause is that so far none of these revelations has actually stopped the political agenda on global warming. Virtually everyone who advocated massive new controls on our economic life in the name of stopping global warming still advocates it. And it's not just because they're in denial and they still think science is on their side. The most frightening new trend—frightening because of what it reveals—is that many of these people are advocating these controls even if the globe is not warming.

It started with President Obama's State of the Union address, when he referred to "the overwhelming scientific evidence on climate change"—eliciting laughter in the chamber—and then went on to say: "But even if you doubt the evidence, providing incentives for energy efficiency and clean energy are the right thing to do for our future—because the nation that leads the clean energy economy will be the nation that leads the global economy." What is notable there is the development of a fallback position in case the public doubts the science. But of course, the fallback position makes no sense. If carbon dioxide is not frying the globe, then windmills and solar cells aren't "clean energy." They're just inefficient energy.

Similarly, Lindsey Graham—one of a handful of Senate Republicans who really drank the Kool-Aid on global warming—has switched to advocating all the same controls as a way to reduce our "dependency" on foreign oil. But of course, the far easier way would be to lift restrictions on offshore drilling and on oil exploration on federal lands.

When this trend finally struck me was in a column by the Washington Post's Dana Milbank that discussed how Washington's big snowstorm was being used by both sides in the global warming debate. Milbank acknowledges that this "argument-by-anecdote" is invalid, briefly refers to Climategate, and then offers this remarkable shift.

For those concerned about warming, it's time for a shift in emphasis. Fortunately, one has already been provided to them by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who has done more than any Democrat to keep climate legislation alive this year. His solution: skip the hurricanes and Himalayan glaciers and keep the argument on the hundreds of billions of dollars spent annually on foreign oil, some of that going to terrorists rather than to domestic job creation.

Al Gore, for one, seems to realize it's time for a new tactic. New TV ads released during last week's blizzards by Gore's climate advocacy group say nothing about climate science. They show workers asking their senators for more jobs from clean energy.

That's a good sign. If the Washington snows persuade the greens to put away the slides of polar bears and pine beetles and to keep the focus on national security and jobs, it will have been worth the shoveling.

With a sinking feeling, I realized that this is the new party line. If the science can no longer be invoked to support massive government controls on the economy, then drop the science. You can drop it, because none of this was ever really about science. It was about power. It was about control. It was about central planning of our lives by the usual gang in Washington.

This is the second time that the left has been forced to drop its mask. The first time was the Fall of the Berlin Wall. For decades, the Western left had claimed that they wanted massive new controls and sweeping power over the economy because economic science was on their side and they were moving us toward a shining utopia of universal prosperity. By the time the Wall came down, everyone knew this was a lie. Everyone knew by then that government control was bad economics and that it was capitalism that actually delivered prosperity.

But the left had already begun a switch to its New Left variant of anti-"consumerism." In effect, their attitude was: if socialism doesn't lead to prosperity, then to heck with prosperity. The pseudo-scientific rationalizations of Marxism could be dropped because they mattered less than the thing they were supposed to rationalize: control of the individual. So the left switched, over a period of decades, from saying that economic science justifies a global economic dictatorship, to claiming that climate science justifies a global economic dictatorship. And now they're panicking again, experimenting with a reverse switch: dropping climate science and going back to economic science, in the form of bogus arguments about "green jobs" and "energy independence."

The persistence of cap-and-trade in the face of Climategate provides us with more evidence that the real essence of the left is a reactionary hatred of capitalism—which means: a hatred of affluence, a hatred of prosperous middle-class strivers (a class to which, ironically, most of the left belongs), and most of all a hatred of the blue-collar entrepreneurs, the Joe-the-Plumber types, who have the temerity to think that they can support themselves and get ahead without the "help" of a paternalistic elite. It is a hatred of the independent individual.

But to confess to such an ugly motive is to ensure one's defeat. This is the left's second big strike-out in two decades, the second time in less than a generation that it will be forced to admit that all of the reams and reams it has written about how its central political cause was justified by facts and science—that all of it was just a rationalization for a grab for power.

The result will be a catastrophic loss of moral legitimacy for the left—and I do not see how they can recover from it.

[9thdoctor]

Thank you fifth. That was a substantive answer.

What’s substantive about telling you to buzz off? If you meant the abortion part, quote it. And please learn to use the quote function, it’s so easy, just hit reply, or multiquote, then type your reply underneath. This way people see where a quote ends and your reply begins, we can go back and make sure you didn’t mess with context etc. It's much better formatting.

Finally, kindly don’t mix me up with the Fifth Doctor, as his fashion sense was most regrettable.

The lapels were just so stupid.

[Peter]

They broke the law. As with Bill Clinton’s little white lie, we should pursue this until 2012.

Placard: "It depends on what the definition of "is," is." and "It's the corruption, Stupid!"

Peter

From Robert Tracinski:

. . . I thought I should give you a heads-up about a developing new scandal in the Obama administration: revelations that the administration offered cabinet positions as payoffs to Democratic politicians in an attempt to get them to drop primary challenges against incumbents favored by the White House. The conservative blog linked to below calls it "Favorgate" and argues that it is a violation of federal law, the equivalent of selling a cabinet seat for money.

I'm not so sure. Cabinet positions are by their nature political appointments and can be awarded for political purposes—for example, to convince a rival candidate, such as Hillary Clinton, to drop out and endorse the front-runner, or to bring a member of the opposition party into the cabinet in order to weaken congressional opposition to the president's agenda.

(The most potential for scandal is the fact that the White House has denied making the job offers, which is almost certainly a lie. As they say, it's not the crime that get you—it's the cover-up.)

But this mini-scandal is still significant because it is part of the same story as the Cornhusker Kickback, the Louisiana Purchase, the special deal exempting unions from the Cadillac Tax, and everything else you might remember from the government takeover of GM and Chrysler, and so on.

It is all part of the swamp of pull-peddling corruption that always accompanies any massive expansion of the size and power of government.

"Favorgate," Mark Impomeni, RedState.com, February 23

Last week, Democratic Senate Candidate Joe Sestak, a retired Admiral, let slip in an interview that someone in the White House offered him a position in the administration if he would drop his primary challenge of Arlen Specter in Pennsylvania. Sestak wouldn't elaborate on which job he was offered—speculation centers on Secretary of the Navy—but it hardly matters. As Jeffrey Lord points out, federal law prohibits anyone from offering, soliciting, or receiving any federal office in exchange for a political favor.

"Whoever solicits or receives…any…thing of value, in consideration of the promise of support or use of influence in obtaining for any person any appointive office or place under the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both." - 18 USC Sec. 211

It seems highly unlikely that this was a misunderstanding or exaggeration on Sestak's part. It's the second time in this election season that another Democrat has accused the White House of trying to buy them out of a Senate challenge with an offer of employment.

Last year, White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel's deputy, Jim Messina, reportedly suggested that Colorado Senate candidate Andrew Romanoff might find himself a position in the Department of the Interior if he dropped his prospective primary challenge of Sen. Michael Bennett. Romanoff, like Sestak, refused to be bought off….

[T]he indications are that this scandal…potentially implicat[es] Emanuel, Axelrod, two Cabinet level officials, Biden, even Obama himself. Thus far, the mainstream press has yawned a collective whoop-dee-doo at the revelations. Republicans should force their hand, accept the gift Obama's ham-handedness may have provide for them, and get the 2010 campaign season started with a good old fashioned Washington scandal.

[Peter]

This is very, very disturbing. It is an attempt to use the power of government to stamp out discourse.

Placard: “I am Spartacus!”

Peter

Once more from Robert Tracinski:

6. The Tea Parties' "I Am Spartacus" Moment

Whenever I see the mainstream media and the political establishment completely misrepresent the nature of the Tea Party movement, I find that I can't get angry or bitter about it. In fact, I find it amusing, because I know that it works to our advantage.

In war, if the enemy makes a big mistake in his evaluation of the battlefield—if he is totally wrong about your position, your numbers, your weaponry, and your intentions—then that's good for you. It means that the enemy will take totally inappropriate and ineffective actions. He will swing at you and miss, knocking himself off balance.

That's why I am delighted at the news of the left's latest campaign to discredit the Tea Party movement. Former President Bill Clinton and one of his old campaign attack dogs, unscrupulous inside-the-beltway hack James Carville, "plan to identify 7-8 national figures active in the Tea Party movement and engage in deep opposition research on them." These leaders will then be "subjected to a full-on smear campaign."

I laughed when I heard this. I laughed because the left actually thinks that the Tea Party movement works the same way as one of Barack Obama's old "community organizer" gigs—that a few professional agitators are responsible for everything, and if you can just take them out, then the whole "Astroturf" grassroots will wither away.

I say, fine. Let them go after Dick Armey or Glenn Beck, or any of a dozen other people—most of them hardened political veterans who have already endured the vetting of years of "opposition research" anyway. What they don't realize is that those political leaders did not call the Tea Party movement into being and do not control it. It is a true grassroots political movement.

The best response to this was produced by one of the better "national" Tea Party groups, Tea Party Patriots, which has urged local Tea Party activists to send in videos identifying themselves to the Clinton machine as the real Tea Party leader—and then editing these confessions into an "I am Spartacus" style montage.

Visit their site, I Am the Tea Party Leader, or read the article below which describes the campaign.

"Memo to Clinton, Carville: Good Luck Finding the Tea Party Spartacus," Mark Tapscott, Washington Examiner, February 23

[T]he Clintonistas have a long history of going after political opponents in such fashion. But this operation is going to be especially difficult because of the Spartacus Factor, identified by the Tea Party Patriots. Don't know what the Spartacus Factor is? Check out this excerpt from the Kirk Douglas movie….

With their usual flair for turning the opposition upon itself, Tea Party Patriots have established this web site where Tea Party leaders from around the country can post their own "I am Spartacus" video to aid Clinton and Carville in figuring out which seven or eight Tea Party national leaders to go after.

That's right sporting of the Tea Party folks, don't you think?

Edited February 26, 2010 by Peter Taylor

[9thdoctor]

That's why I am delighted at the news of the left's latest campaign to discredit the Tea Party movement. Former President Bill Clinton and one of his old campaign attack dogs, unscrupulous inside-the-beltway hack James Carville, "plan to identify 7-8 national figures active in the Tea Party movement and engage in deep opposition research on them." These leaders will then be "subjected to a full-on smear campaign."

I laughed when I heard this. I laughed because the left actually thinks that the Tea Party movement works the same way as one of Barack Obama's old "community organizer" gigs—that a few professional agitators are responsible for everything, and if you can just take them out, then the whole "Astroturf" grassroots will wither away.

<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="

name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="

type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>

[Peter]

Here is a man to consider as being worthy of a Tea Party. At the bottom are excerpts from his bio on Wikipedia. Be sure and check out the last paragraph. He is 40 years old, so he is old enough to serve as POTUS OR VPOTUS.

He took on Obama at that recent dog and pony show. Articulate, passionate, and fiscally conservative would describe him.

Go to his website. It is well done and has in depth discussion of everything from energy to immigration.

http://www.house.gov/ryan/roadmap/

The only mention of his religious affiliation is on his web site. He is a member of St. John Vianney’s Parish. So religion is not pushed by him. No where is abortion mentioned on his web site

Placard: “Invite Rep. Paul Ryan to the Tea Party in 2012.”

From Wiki

Paul D. Ryan, Jr. (born January 29, 1970) is an American politician and Congressman from Wisconsin. He is a member of the Republican Party, and represents Wisconsin's 1st congressional district (map) in the U.S. House of Representatives. In 2010, Daily Telegraph ranked him 9th most influential US conservative.[1]

Ryan, born and raised in Janesville, Wisconsin, is a fifth-generation Wisconsin native currently serving his sixth term in Congress.

Ryan is a graduate of Joseph A. Craig High School in Janesville and earned a degree in economics and political science from Miami University in Ohio where he was a member of Delta Tau Delta Fraternity. He has worked in the private sector as an economic analyst and previously served as president of his own consulting firm.

Ryan and his wife Janna live in Janesville, Wisconsin with their children, Liza, Charlie and Sam.

Ryan worked as an aide to U.S. Senator Bob Kasten beginning in 1992 and as legislative director for Sam Brownback of Kansas from 1995 to 1997. He worked as a speechwriter to "drug czar" William Bennett and to Jack Kemp during his run for the vice presidency.

He was first elected to the House in 1998 after two-term incumbent Mark Neumann made an unsuccessful bid for the Senate. Ryan defeated 29-year-old pianist Michael J. Logan of Twin Lakes, WI in the Republican primary and Democrat Lydia Spottswood in the general election by a 57-42 margin.[citation needed]

He defeated Jeffrey C. Thomas in 2000, 2002, 2004, and 2006. In the general election on November 4, 2008, Ryan defeated Marge Krupp, the Democratic candidate.

On May 21, 2008 Ryan introduced H.R. 6110, titled "Roadmap for America's Future Act of 2008".[2] This proposed legislation outlined a plan to deal with entitlement issues. Its stated objectives were to ensure universal access to health insurance; strengthen Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security; lift the debt from future generations; and promote economic growth and job creation in America.[3] The act would have abolished the State Children's Health Insurance Program in 2010.[4] It did not move past committee.[5]

On April 1, 2009, Ryan introduced the GOP Alternative to the 2010 United States federal budget. This proposed alternative would have eliminated the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, lowered the top tax rate to 25%, and imposed a five-year spending freeze on all discretionary spending.[6] It would also have replaced the Medicare system.[7] Instead, it proposed that starting in 2021, the federal government would pay part of the cost of private medical insurance for individuals turning 65.[7] Ryan's proposed budget would also have allowed taxpayers to opt out of the federal income taxation system with itemized deductions, and instead pay a flat 10 percent of adjusted gross income up to $100,000 and 25 percent on any remaining income.[8] Ryan's proposed budget was heavily criticized by opponents for the lack of concrete numbers[9] and the proposed privatization of Medicare.[citation needed] It was ultimately rejected in the house by a vote of 293-137, with 38 Republicans in opposition.[10]

[Selene]

[Peter]

Two quotes from Mitt Romney from the article below:

But in every case throughout modern history in which America has exercised military power, we have acted with good intention—not to colonize, not to subjugate, never to oppress.

And after listening to Israel’s Shimon Perez:

Everyone in the room was silent for a moment, and no one pressed him further on his opinion about Iraq. I was deeply moved. And I was reminded of former secretary of state Colin Powell’s observation that the only land America took after World War II was what was needed to bury our dead.

end quotes

Along with Representative Paul Ryan, Mitt Romney is someone to be considered as a Tea Party backed candidate. He is not an isolationist like Ron Paul. He thinks a free and prosperous America requires a strong military and presence around the world. And he makes a good case for it too. There are a billion muslims out there, with millions of them ready to dominate the globe with a murderous theocracy.

America! Stand your ground!

Semper cogitans fidele,

Peter Taylor

Newsmax

Mitt Romney Offers Bold Blueprint for America With 'No Apology'

Monday, March 1, 2010 07:55 PM

By: Mitt Romney

Former Massachusetts governor and 2008 presidential candidate Mitt Romney is offering a dramatic new blueprint for the nation to confront our most critical issues. Newsmax is pleased to present exclusive excerpts from Gov. Romney’s just-released book, “No Apology: The Case for American Greatness." In “No Apology,” Gov. Romney exposes how the Obama administration and even the Republican Party are failing to confront budget deficits, declining global competitiveness, a weakened military, inadequate healthcare, failing education, and our energy needs. In this exclusive excerpt for Newsmax.com, Gov. Romney discusses how he came to the realization that America needed to be set back on track:

I’ve run for office three times, losing twice, winning once. Each time, when the campaign was over, I felt that I hadn’t done an adequate job communicating all that I had intended to say. Some of that is because debate answers are limited to sixty seconds, ads are thirty seconds, and lengthy position papers are rarely read at all.

This book gives me a chance to say more than I did during my campaign. That established, my interest in writing the book goes back well before my political life. My career in the private sector exposed me to developments abroad and conditions at home that were deeply troubling.

At the same time, I saw that most of us were not aware of the consequences of blithely continuing along our current course: We have become so accustomed to the benefits of America’s greatness that we cannot imagine any significant disruption of what we have known.

Special: Get Mitt Romney’s New Book, “No Apology” — Incredible FREE Offer — Click Here Now.

I was reminded of a book I had read when I was in France during the late 1960s. Jean- Jacques Servan-Schreiber was a journalist and a businessperson, and he became convinced that France and Europe were in danger of falling far and irretrievably behind the United States.

His book, “The American Challenge,” stirred his countrymen to action and helped galvanize pan-European economic and political collaboration. While I am sufficiently realistic to recognize that this volume is highly unlikely to have as great an impact as did his, it is my hope that it will affect the thinking and perspectives of those who read it.

Thus, this is not a collection of my positions on all the important issues of the day; in fact, a number of issues I care about are not included. This is not a policy book that explores issues in greater depth than do scholars and think tanks—I treat topics in a single chapter that others have made the subject of entire volumes. Nor is this an attack piece on all the policies of the Obama administration, although criticism is unavoidable with policies that I believe are the most harmful to the future generations of America.

This is a book about what I believe should be our primary national objective: to keep America strong and to preserve its place as the world’s leading nation. And it describes the course I believe we must take to strengthen the nation in order to remain prosperous, secure, and free.

There are some who may question the national objective I propose. I make no apology for my conviction that America’s economic and military leadership is not only good for America but also critical for freedom and peace across the world. Accordingly, as I consider the various issues before the nation, I evaluate our options largely by whether they would make America stronger or weaker.

In my first chapters, I consider geopolitical threats and lessons from the history of great nations of the past. In subsequent chapters, I describe domestic challenges to our national strength and propose actions to overcome them. My final chapter is intended to provide a means for future Americans to gauge whether we have been successful in setting a course that will preserve America’s greatness throughout the twenty-first century. It describes as well the source of my optimism for America’s future.

These are difficult times: homes have lost value, nest eggs have been eroded, retirees have become anxious about their future, and millions upon millions of Americans are out of work. Inexcusable mistakes and failures precipitated the descent that has hurt so many people. But even as we endure the current shocks, we know that this will not go on forever; we know that because America is a strong and prosperous nation, the economic cycle will eventually right itself and the future will be brighter than the present.

While I will touch upon today’s difficulties, my focus is on the growing challenges to the foundations of our national strength. How we confront these challenges will determine what kind of America and world we will bequeath to our children and grandchildren.

This is a book about securing that future of freedom, peace, and prosperity in the only way possible: by strengthening America. A strong America is our only assurance that prosperity will follow hardship and that our lives and liberty will always be secure.

The strength of the nation has been challenged before—at its birth, during the Civil War, in the peril of world wars. It is challenged again today. In our past, Americans have risen to the occasion by confronting the challenge honestly and laying their sacrifice upon the altar of freedom. We must do so again.

Facing Our Challenges Head-On

I can remember only one time during my life when most Americans presumed that we didn’t really have any great challenges. It was during the period that largely coincided with the Bill Clinton presidency. George H. W. Bush and Ronald Reagan had pushed the Soviet Union to the wall and won. The Berlin Wall had come down, the Soviet Union had dissolved, and here at home, there was talk of a “new economy” that sent the bulls running on Wall Street. Columnist Charles Krauthammer has called it our “holiday from history.” We believed that peace and prosperity were here to stay—without threat, without sacrifice.

In some ways, we advanced as a nation during these years. The Internet boomed, and the pockets of millions of average Americans grew deeper. But did these years of ease make us a stronger, more free or secure nation?

We shrunk our military by 400,000 troops during the 1990s, retired over one hundred ships from the navy, and decreased the size of our air force by more than a quarter. More ominously, we gutted our human intelligence capabilities, and never took any real steps to infiltrate the violent jihadist groups like al-Qaida that had declared war on America.

At home, births to teenage mothers rose to their highest levels in decades, teenage drug use climbed, and pornography became the Internet’s biggest business. Our dependence on foreign oil rose from 42 percent of our total consumption in 1990 to 58 percent today.

I don’t wish challenges and hard times on this nation, even though I believe they have made us the country and people we are today. But neither do I fear them. My sole concern is that Americans will choose not to act, not to face our challenges head-on, not to overcome them.

In the first decade of the twenty-first century, our economy has suffered its worst crisis since the Great Depression. We have amassed an unprecedented amount of debt and liabilities, and added to that, the Obama administration plans trillion-dollar deficits every year. Russian belligerence is on the rise. China holds over $750 billion of U.S. obligations. Iran and North Korea threaten the world with unbridled nuclear ambition. Violent jihadists like those who attacked us on 9/11 plot our destruction. The consequence of failure to act in response to these perils is unthinkable.

America will remain the leading nation in the world only if we overcome our challenges. We will be strong, free, prosperous, and safe. But if we do not face them, I suspect the United States will become the France of the twenty-first century— still a great country, but no longer the world’s leading nation. What’s chilling to consider is that if America is not the superpower, others will take our place. What nation or nations would rise, and what would be the consequences for our safety, freedom, and prosperity?

The world is a safer place when America is strong. Ronald Reagan remarked that “of the four wars in my lifetime, none came about because the U.S. was too strong.” America’s strength destroyed Hitler’s fascism. It stopped the North Koreans and Chinese at the 38th parallel and allowed South Koreans to claim their freedom and reach prosperity. American strength kicked Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait, and later pulled him out of his spider hole.

There are a number of thoughtful people around the world who don’t welcome America’s strength. In 2007, several reputable polls asked European citizens which nation they perceived as the greatest threat to international peace. Their answer was the United States. I was incredulous when I first read this, and presumed the respondents must have had the Iraq War on their minds when they answered. Surely they hadn’t considered what Russia would do in Eastern Europe if America was weak; what China would do in Taiwan; what the Taliban would do in Afghanistan; what Fidel Castro, Hugo Chávez, Kim Jong-Il, or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad would have in mind for their neighbors. The very existence of American power helps to hold tyrants in check and reduces the risk of precipitous war.

Does America make mistakes? Absolutely. We never fully understood the enormously complex political, economic, and military issues we faced in Vietnam, and we were wrong in our assessment of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction programs. But in every case throughout modern history in which America has exercised military power, we have acted with good intention—not to colonize, not to subjugate, never to oppress.

During my tenure as governor of Massachusetts, I had the opportunity to join a small group of people in meeting Shimon Peres, Israel’s former prime minister and current president. In casual conversation, someone asked him what he thought about the ongoing conflict in Iraq. Given his American audience, I expected him to respond diplomatically but with a degree of criticism. But what he said caught me very much by surprise.

“First, I must put something in context,” he began. “America is unique in the history of the world. In the history of the world, whenever there has been war, the nation that is victorious has taken land from the nation that has been defeated— land has always been the basis of wealth on our planet.

Only one nation in history, and this during the last century, was willing to lay down hundreds of thousands of lives and take no land in its victory— no land from Germany, no land from Japan. America. America is unique in the history of the world for its willingness to sacrifice so many lives of its precious sons and daughters for liberty, not solely for itself but also for its friends.”

Everyone in the room was silent for a moment, and no one pressed him further on his opinion about Iraq. I was deeply moved. And I was reminded of former secretary of state Colin Powell’s observation that the only land America took after World War II was what was needed to bury our dead.

Some argue that the world would be safer if America’s strength were balanced by another superpower, or perhaps by two or three. And others believe that we should simply accept the notion that our power is limited.

British Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm in his book, “On Empire,” asserts, “It is also troubling that there is no historical precedent for the global superiority that the American government has been trying to establish and it is quite clear to any good historian and to all rational observers of the world scene that this project will almost certainly fail.”

I take a different view. The United States is unique. American strength does not threaten world peace. American strength helps preserve world peace.

It is true that the emergence of other great powers is not entirely up to us— several other nations are building economic and military power and we will not stop them from doing so. But we can determine, entirely on our own, that we will not fall behind them. And the only way I know to stay even is to aim unabashedly at staying ahead.

Mitt Romney is a former governor of Massachusetts. Best known for his 2008 race for the Republican nomination for president, he has a remarkable career in private business, with his investment company, Bain Capital, helping to grow companies like Staples, Domino’s Pizza, FTD Florists and The Sports Authority, among others. In 1998 he left Bain to serve as CEO of the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City. A frequent speaker and national television commentator, Mr. Romney has recently formed the Free And Strong America Political Action Committee. His latest book is “No Apology: The Case for American Greatness” from St. Martin’s Press.

[Selene]

One of the singers is Marlena Dietrich - it is worth it just for that, good video...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lGL7MElKbvA

Peter:

As to your long posts that most do not read.

Adam

[Peter]

The Placard reads:

"I'm not with the party of 'no.' I'm with the party of 'hell, no.'"

Peter

TIA Daily • March 3, 2010

FEATURE ARTICLE

The Party of "Hell, No"

The Tea Party's Over—Time for the Tar and Feathers

by Robert Tracinski

At one of the very first tea party rallies—this was February of last year—I remember a young lady carrying a sign that really summed up the spirit of the movement. It read: "Tea Party Now—Tar and Feathers Later."

So far, the tea parties have been a polite warning. For all of the left's smears about how the tea party movement is driven by "hate"—another rehearsal of the left's favorite racism smear—the rallies have actually had something of a festive mood. In the enlightened free society that we still live in, the tea partiers have had the sense that if enough of us raise our voices, our political leaders will have to listen.

Well, they didn't. So now the tea party is over—and it's time for the tar and feathers.

No, I'm not advocating violence against anyone, and I'm not saying that we should actually smear Democratic politicians with hot tar and daub them with feathers. Though I can't help thinking that among the millions of supporters of the tea party movement, there must be more than a few roofers and certainly a few poultry farmers. And if they were to form a caravan headed to Washington, DC, hauling tar wagons and trucks full of feathers, that might have nice symbolic impact. Just an idea.

But what I really mean is that the time for polite warnings is over. It's time to instill in the Democratic establishment in Washington a healthy fear and respect for the American people.

That's a respect they evidently lack, because President Obama has once again launched a push for a health-care bill that the American people overwhelmingly oppose.

The message from the public could hardly have been delivered more clearly. We shouted it at our representatives at town hall meetings, we explained it to pollsters—the roughly 60% of us who oppose the bill—and when the people of Massachusetts, of all places, were given a chance to vote for a Senate candidate who vowed to block the legislation, they leaped at the opportunity.

The message we've gotten in return has also been crystal clear. A writer at The New Republic put it most brazenly, in his title for an article praising the president's new campaign: "Americans Aren't Enthused About Obama's Agenda. Screw 'Em." That's the essence of the president's message, too, though he puts it a little more politely. Ignoring everything the American people have actually said over the past year, Obama declared that "They are waiting for us to act. They are waiting for us to lead." The New York Times report then adds that "advisers to Mr. Obama are betting that the politics of health care will eventually turn in the party’s favor, if the president can actually sign a bill into law."

What that means is: Americans expect me, Barack Obama, to decide what's good for them and shove it down their throats—and later on they'll realize that it was for their own good.

As patronizing as this concept of leadership is to begin with, it is packaged in a particularly repellent form: an attempt to use the legislative tactic of "reconciliation"—intended for minor budget changes, not for major pieces of legislation—as a way to bypass the filibuster in the Senate. It is a tactic all of the Democrats, including Obama, are on record as opposing—when it was convenient for them.

Even the talk of "reconciliation" is deceptive, though, because the first step of this process is for House Democrats to pass the existing Senate version of the bill, with a promise that the Senate will use reconciliation later on to "fix" the parts that the House doesn't like. But that promise is just a ruse for gullible House Democrats, because once they have voted on the Senate bill, it will be signed by the president and ObamaCare becomes law—at which point Obama no longer needs them, and it doesn't really matter whether or not the Senate uses reconciliation to tweak the bill.

So the only real showdown is in the House—and it could come within days. What we need urgently, right now, is a public siege of House members that will make last August's Town Hall Hell look like—well, like a tea party.

It has become clear that the Democrats won't be stopped by fear of losing this fall's election. Indeed, they have already taken such a loss into account. So we need to raise the pressure to a new level. To heck with whether or not they win re-election; we need to make Democrats afraid that if they support this bill they will never be able to move back to their home districts. They need to be afraid that they won't be able to go out in public without being harangued—that every audience they address from now on will be an angry mob—that they will become lifelong pariahs for defying the will of the people. We need to make a vow that every Democrat who goes along with this bill will be a marked man for the rest of his life—or at least until the health care bill is repealed.

And that brings me to what the Republicans can do to actually earn our support this fall. They must do everything they can—using every procedural trick in the book—to slow down Congress and obstruct a vote on this bill. If they can drag it out until the end of the month, Democratic congressmen will then be forced to return to their districts over Congress's Spring break—where they will face a reaction that will make the heat of last August seem mild by comparison.

Moreover, Republicans must immediately gather together and vow, as a group, to repeal the Democratic health care bill if it passes. They need to make clear that this will not be some wishy-washy partial repeal that leaves large parts of the legislation intact, so the Democrats at least end up with half a loaf. The Republicans need to draft up a repeal bill in the simplest possible terms—one sentence will do: "The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 is hereby repealed." They must then declare that this repeal will be their first act as a congressional majority in 2011 and that it will be the first bill they send to a Republican president in 2013. The Republicans must make it clear that if the Democrats are going to sacrifice everything for this bill—their offices, their reputations, their peace and sanity—they will be sacrificing for nothing.

In short, the Republicans should take their cue from a sign carried by one of the patriots at the September 12 tea party rally: "I'm not with the party of 'no.' I'm with the party of 'hell, no.'"

Yes, these are unusual hardball tactics—but the provocation is unusual. Never has a bill this vast, with such a wide and intimate impact on the American people, been passed without significant support from the opposition party. Never has such a bill been passed without the support of the public. Never has the party in power shown such contempt for the governed.

That is, not since 1773. Back then, we had a tea party first—and the tar and feathers came later.

[Peter]

One of “the best out there,” Representative Paul Ryan from Wisconsin, falls short of Objectivist Government standards, but he is “for” an easily passed first fix. However, I am having second thoughts about codifying any percent of the economy as the Governments, as Ryan suggests, to do with as they please.

I have worked since I was 14 years old and now I am on Social Security. I want what I paid into it preserved. I am owed that but no more. Pragmatically, I don’t think any legislation that touches “the third rail,” will ever pass.

So, after 2012, we will need to work with what is left to us, but keep our radical, Randian Tea Party vision alive. I am feeling energized.

My suggestion for a placard slogan comes from Ed Hudgins’ article , “The Prophetic Atlas Shrugged,” in this month’s The New Individualist:” I’ll keep my money, my freedom & my guns & you keep the ‘change,’”

Semper cogitans fidele,

Peter Taylor

Robert Tracinski wrote in the Intellectual Activist Daily March 13, 2010:

Why I Am Not a Conservative

As I've gotten more involved with the local tea party movement here in Charlottesville, I've had to explain to a few people that I do not consider myself to be a conservative. Instead, I think of myself as a liberal and a progressive.

No, really. The word "liberal" means "pro-freedom"—and you can't really be in favor of freedom unless you advocate economic freedom. Nor can you be an advocate of "progress" without recognizing the enormous, unprecedented human progress created by capitalism.

This is one of the problems I have with commentators like Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck. Limbaugh always refers to the left as "liberals," and Beck has been popularizing the label "progressives"—which at least has real historical roots in the proto-leftist Progressive movement of the early 20th century.

But both terms give the left way too much credit. They are not liberal or progressive—they are tribalist reactionaries.

It is the American ideal of liberty that is still radical. The cause of individual rights is the real crusade for "change," historically speaking. So I don't think advocates of liberty should ever think of ourselves as merely wanting to "conserve" a historical status quo. We should think of ourselves as idealists seeking to transform the world with the radical new concept of individual rights.

Here's an example of why that mindset matters. Wisconsin congressman Paul Ryan has been getting a lot of attention lately. As the top Republican on the House committee that deals with the budget, he has been sounding the alarm about the administration's runaway spending and borrowing, and he has authored his own "road map" for balancing the federal budget over the long term.

I haven't spent much time talking about Ryan's plan, because it's all pretty academic until Republicans have the votes they need—in Congress and ultimately in the White House—to attempt this kind of giant reform. But the main link below gives you an idea of how limited Ryan's plan is.

Its goal is to preserve the welfare state and the middle class entitlements, while pegging federal taxes at their "historical norm" of 19% of GDP. This really is a "conservative" plan. Its goal is to embalm the post-World-War-II mixed-economy welfare state —but a "fiscally responsible" welfare state—as if it were our new Constitution.

That's literally the case with another idea: Congressman Mike Pence's Spending Limit Amendment, a proposed constitutional amendment that would limit federal spending to 20% of GDP. But this would involve writing into the Constitution the idea that it's OK for the government to take one-fifth of everything we produce. I don't remember reading that in the Federalist Papers.

I'm all for getting federal taxes and spending back below 20% of GDP. (Under Obama, both have jumped to about 25%.) But getting to 20% is just a first step toward getting to 15%, then to 10%, then below 10%, down to the very low level required to fund only the legitimate functions of government. It's just a step toward the radical, liberal, progressive vision of our Founding Fathers.

"Paul Ryan: The Roadmap Warrior," Matthew Continetti, Weekly Standard, March 10

Paul Ryan's Roadmap for America's Future would drastically overhaul the American welfare state in a free-market direction. The Congressional Budget Office says it would solve the entitlements crisis through a series of changes to Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid. The Roadmap also includes a fundamental tax reform—one that Ryan says, and the CBO assumes, would bring in revenues equivalent to the long-term historical average of 19-percent of GDP….

In a statement last night, Ryan said that "the purpose of the Roadmap is to get spending in line with revenue—not the other way around." He reiterated that argument in his conversation with me today. "The point is the spending."…

The dynamic effects of Ryan's reforms are impossible to predict. Over time, government would shrink, investment would expand, and America's credit rating would improve. America would become a haven for foreign capital. Her citizens would have more individual choice and, yes, more individual responsibility. "Policies such as these," Irving Kristol wrote decades ago in his essay "The Republican Future," "have the obvious advantage of reconciling the purposes of the welfare state with the maximum degree of individual independence and the least bureaucratic coercion."

[Selene]

Peter:

Where are these standards codified?

falls short of Objectivist Government standards

Adam

started working at twelve (12) forged my working papers

guess those extra two years allowed me to gain the knowledge to use the quote function****

**** Step 1 -

- left click on the little comic cartoon bubble next to the envelope above which is under the crayon

Step 2 - cut and past the text between the two (2)

s that appear

<in here>

Step 3 - type your post on the next line

Edited March 13, 2010 by Selene