Sharp Knife

POWER

"The Greenpeace booth at all the rock and roll shows nowadays are akin to the old sorcerers who used to stand in the middle of villages warning of danger, 'When night wolf swallows mother moon, there will be great famine.' "--P.J. O'Rourke

Sorry, P.J., but Night Wolf the Magical Activist now has an office in the West Wing, and he's conjuring policy out of organic free-range snail darter placentas tossed into solar-evaporated distilled bong-water.

Planet Gore:

On Earth Day, Jon Wellinghoff — President Obama’s month-old pick as chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission — claimed that we may never have to build base-load coal or nuclear power plants again. Windmills are going to take care of everything. (“Base load” comes from power plants that run night and day, keeping the world running...)

Let me tell you, anybody who says this hasn’t the slightest idea what he’s talking about. This is just boilerplate picked up from a hundred handouts by environmental groups. ... It’s almost superfluous to note here that Wellinghoff is a lawyer and not an engineer.

What Wellinghoff has said is identical to what Jerry Brown — “Governor Moonbeam” — announced when he decided to put California on the “soft energy path” in 1980. The Golden State didn’t build any new base-load power plants for 20 years. It practiced draconian conservation, subsidized every conceivable form of so-called renewable energy from wind farms to solar collectors to burning old tires for electricity — and by 2000, it didn’t have enough electricity to run its traffic lights.

That’s the road we’re now going down as a nation. This isn’t some wild-eyed pamphleteer from Greenpeace talking. This is the chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. FERC has to give its permission before any new power plant in the country can be built.

Start laying in diesel generators. It’s going to be a rough ride.

Back when John Kerry was still helping Willie Horton pack his bags for for long weekends on the Maryland shore, Ronald Reagan proposed his own "Global Test":

Do we find the answers to human misery in freedom as it is known, or do we sink into the deadly dullness of the Socialist ant heap?

Those who suggest that the latter is some kind of solution are, I think, open to challenge. Let’s have no more theorizing when actual comparison is possible. There is in the world a great nation, larger than ours in territory and populated with 250 million capable people. It is rich in resources and has had more than 50 uninterrupted years to practice socialism without opposition.

We could match them, but it would take a little doing on our part. We’d have to cut our paychecks back by 75 percent; move 60 million workers back to the farm; abandon two-thirds of our steel-making capacity; destroy 40 million television sets; tear up 14 of every 15 miles of highway; junk 19 of every 20 automobiles; tear up two-thirds of our railroad track; knock down 70 percent of our houses; and rip out nine out of every 10 telephones.

What Reagan proposed as a joke is essentially the enviromental and industrial policy (yecch--the very phrase smells of East German border guards) of this administration.

Yeah--I know; Eric Honecker wasn't known for his sense of humor either. But he made the wind run on time.

LEAVE IT TO CLEAVERS

“In my country, and in my family, I believe that a marriage should be between a man and a woman.”--Miss California Carrie Prejean

NEVER


"Our difficulties come from a mood of unwarrantable self abasement into which we have been cast by a powerful section of our own intellectuals. The come from the acceptance of defeatist doctrines by a large proportion of our politicians. We are told to believe that patriotism is worn out, except where paying income tax is concerned. But what have they found to put in its place? Nothing but a vague internationalism; a squalid materialism and the promise of a Utopia….Nothing can save England if England will not save herself. If we have lost our place and our capacity to guide, if we have lost our faith in ourselves, then indeed our story is told. If, while foreign nations are everyday asserting a more aggressive, a more militant nationalism, either by trade or by arms, while we remain paralysed by our own theories. If that be so, then deprived of the sovereignty of the seas, loaded with debt and taxation, our commerce shut out by foreign tariffs and quotas, England would sink to the level of a fifth rate power. Never should we accept such a fate for our country."--Winston Churchill, 1933

IRONY ABOUNDING:

Our dubiously-elected Saudi princeling was clueless, but a former British prime minister would've known exactly what we were doing out there.


Charles Moore:

People like Mrs Thatcher – state-educated, lower-middle-class, provincial, female – were not supposed to question the 1945 state-socialist settlement. To its architects, such people were of no account. They were neither poor enough to attract romantic sympathy, nor grand enough to be entitled to power. They were expected to know their place.

Mark Steyn:

There's a lot of that in that CNN reporter's coverage of the Tea Parties: You'll be getting your $400 Obama "tax credit". So what's your beef? Why don't you know your place?

These people also are "neither poor enough to attract romantic sympathy, nor grand enough to be entitled to power". Which is why the media feel free to sneer. In the long run, a society can function without Susan Roesgen, but not without a small-business sector and a middle-class that's able to retain the fruits of its labors.

Margaret Thatcher, Oct. 11, 1968:

We started off with a wish on the part of the people for more government intervention in certain spheres. This was met. But there came a time when the amount of intervention got so great that it could no longer be exercised in practice by government but only by more and more officials or bureaucrats. Now it is difficult if not impossible for people to get at the official making the decision and so paradoxically although the degree of intervention is greater, the government has become more and more remote from the people. The present result of the democratic process has therefore been an increasing authoritarianism.

Do you know your place?

YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE TRUTH COMMISSION

Marine Confesses He Witnessed Torture

My fellow veterans please forgive me. But I must purge my soul. I only ask that you reserve judgment until you read all of if. I only want peace for all and a world free of torture.

What I saw in the military was much worse than water boarding. The prisoners were taken to a 12 foot deep pool. Feet weighted they were forced into the pool. Those who hesitated, were moved onto a plank high above the pool and forced off. They were to stay in this deep water for over an hour feet weighted and in full clothing. Those who touched the side of the pool had their fingers stepped on by angry guards. Not enough to break their fingers as that would reveal this terrible secret but just enough to inflect severe pain without detectable injury. The guards knew their craft well. Like water boarding, the prisoners were not allowed to drown. No, that would expose the cover-up.

It gets worse! I must tell all! They were then taken to a wooden building far from the main complex. A lantern like device burned in the middle of the building. It gave off a horrible gas. The prisoners were forced to run around the lantern without the benefit of the gas masks worn by the guards and sing in their native language their country’s patriotic songs. I saw them with my own eyes as they were finally released from the windowless building: eyes red, mucus flowing uncontrollably from their mouths and noses. Some looked near death. A spec of humanity prevailed as they were allowed to recover for several minutes before being taken to the bleachers.

The prisoners were taken to the bleachers. I think there were about one hundred of them. They were not restrained, no that would blow this horrible trick. The bleachers were located in a bug infested marsh. Those prisoners who moved their hands in any effort to ward of the flying bugs were severely punished. Mockingly, the guards in the native language of the prisoners said that “their bugs had to eat too.” The guard threw a dud hand grenade into the helpless group. He laughed as they scattered in terror. The prisoners were regathered and prepared for more.

I saw one prisoner taken out of out of line in just his shorts which were on backwards. Horrible sexual innuendos and insults were directed at him. I saw a tear roll down his cheek.

The prisoners were United States Marine recruits the “torture” described above was part of our training. The guards were drill instructors. The above is why we shake our heads in disbelief when water-boarding, bugs, and loud music are described as torture by the main stream press.

The above prepared us for combat so that fair-weather pacifists can stand on our street corners only in the best of weather. God forbid, they should be out in the cold or even worse the rain as that would resemble water-boarding.

Ed
USMC.
Vietnam 1967-1968

THEY WERE POOR LOSERS

when they lost, and now that they've won, they're damn poor winners, too!. It's the hallmark of those who want it both ways. And talk of "Truth Commissions" only show how eaten up they are with Bush Derangement Syndrome.


Noemie Emery says 'Bring it on!':

The first job of a president is to safeguard his country and fellow citizens, which Bush did, to the apparent dismay of the opposition. Usually, an investigation takes place after someone has failed in his duty, to find out what went wrong so that it can be changed and improved on. But no attacks on U.S. soil in the seven-plus years between September 11, 2001, and January 20, 2009, is a record of success. Do the Democrats want to find out what went right, and then change it, to avoid repetition? The way that they're going, they probably will.

Nancy Pelosi says she was supposed to be informed when the waterboarding started so she could speak out in time to protect the terrorists and warn America of Bush's War Crimes. Not to get personal, but I suspect she's lying through her fangs.

Paul Begala says, wrongly, of course, that we executed Japs for waterboarding and we mustn't be hypocrites. His logic dictates that we execute Bush. No mention of a trial yet.

It's good to see such a stalwart defense of the death penalty from the same liberals who are against executing bin Laden. Next, they'll be claiming that bin Laden, not Bush, kept us safe for the last 8 years.

Say--what sentence do Bill Clinton and Al "Go Grab His Ass" Gore deserve, Paul? After all, they conducted extraordinary renditions in which terrorists were tortured to death. Come to think of it, you were there--did you know about these War Crimes at the time? Did you speak up? Did you try to stop them? Did you warn America? Why not? We imprisoned Japanese for covering up less, you know.

Now Obama has put the ACLU in charge of troop morale and will be releasing old photos purported to show soldiers being mean to terrorists.


The Tank :

The photos are not egregious. Not even rising to the level of panties on heads. But no matter. The assault is on. And your president — your Commander in Chief — supports it. ...

ACLU attorney Amrit Singh tells ABC News that "the fact that the Obama administration opted not to seek further review is a sign that it is committed to more transparency."

No. It is a sign that the Obama administration holds no perceived loyalty to the American Warrior and is, in fact, putting them under assault in a display of loyalty instead to the ACLU.

Obama seems to think he'll emerge unscathed from this double game. He will not. Just because the Tongue-Bath Media was able to wash enough of the Chicago Stench off of him to get him elected doesn't mean that nothing will ever stick. He's got a real job for the first time in his life and Americans will sooner or later demand results, not endless cheap campaign tricks.

When your entire schtick consists of throwing everything and everyone under the bus, up to and including your own grandmother, even your friends start to notice that you're spending all your time in the Greyhound Station men's room, trying to wash some indelible stain from your hands, a stain that only you can see.

All this shows is what a weak and feckless "leader" he is, a passive puppet who bows, apologizes, blames others, deflects and genuflects while constantly checking his own image in the mirror. He's afraid to confront the nuts who helped put him in power.

They'll help remove him, too, with their out-of-control nuttiness. The very idea of a Truth Commission is repellent and un-American--but, hey, that's who we've foolishly put in charge.

George Bush roughed up three terrorists who leveled the World Trade Center and did so in order to save the Brooklyn Bridge. Barack Obama thinks that America is kept safe by releasing Gitmo detainees to
move in next door to you --and giving them welfare!

That's a debate I'm willing to have.

So bring on the Truther Commissions--The Squirreled is Watching!

TO GIVE YOU EVERYTHING

will eventually give you a ticket for parking in your own driveway. I've heard of toll roads before, but not toll driveways.

If you don't like it, for only a few thousand dollars per year they'll graciously allow you lease your own driveway from them.

Yeah--it's DC.

"Statehood?" Hell, they're not even ready for hunting and gathering, let alone the tollbooth keys to the Senatorial HOV-lane on the Driveway to Serfdom.

"EVERY CHILD LEFT BEHIND"

“I owe those unions. When their leaders call, I do my best to call them back right away. I don’t consider this corrupting in any way."--Barack Hussein Obama, The Audacity of Hope

"There's not a dime's worth of difference between the Democrat and Republican Parties."--George Corly Wallace, Jr.

The Education Unions think there's a dime's worth of difference--that's why they pay billions to Democrats.

I recently compared Gov. George Wallace (D.-Alabama) to Pres. Barack Obama (D.-Chicago), saying that they both stood in the schoolhouse door, telling minority children "Stay Out!".

Upon further reflection, I realize that this comparison was unfair...to Governor Wallace.

Wallace tried to stop black students from entering the University of Alabama. In Obama's case, the students are already inside the schoolhouse, attending classes with his daughters--and he's dragging them out of the building by the heels. Wallace said "Keep Out!" while Obama says "Get Out and Stay Out!"

We're told that Wallace and the Southerners of those days were ignorant and uneducated--yet Obama is doing the same thing on behalf of the most educated class in the nation--educators! And we're constantly told he is the Smartest Man in the World(tm.)!

Wallace was a populist who came to care about the plight of poor working people, both black and white. But Crown Prince Obama of Saudi Arabia (why else would he bow to the king?) is siding with affluent teachers and wealthy union bosses--the rich adults-- over the needs of poor children.

And the populist Wallace was against monopolies--while Obama strolls down Boardwalk in the service of the Education Cartel--The Audacity of Park Place.

Obama: "I don’t mind feeling obligated [to union leaders]."

Lester Maddox felt obligated, too--that's not the issue. Where is the obligation to taxpayers, to parents and especially to schoolchildren?

Wallace believed that schools should be run for the benefit of white people. Obama believes that schools should be run for the benefit of union people. And that private schools should be run for the benefit of rich people.

Poor parents have the audacity to hope that their kids can get a good education, too, without today's Democrats standing in the schoolhouse door with axe handles in their hands. They may not be royalty like the Obamas, but in their audaciousness, they still hope against hope that their children will be treated as equals, given the same choices as their "betters", even though they can't contribute billions to Democrats.

Ignorant parents; don't they know that the Audacity to Hope is for union bosses and politicians only?

"The mere thought of returning to public school frightens me."--Ms. Deborah Parker, who, like the Obamas is the parent of two Sidwell Friends students. The only difference is, she's not trying to have the Obama's children removed.

Bill McGurn:

The beauty of this [Durbin] language is that it allows opponents to kill the program simply by doing nothing. Just the sort of sneaky maneuver that's so handy when you don't want inner-city moms and dads to catch on that you are cutting one of their lifelines.

Deborah Parker says such a move would be devastating for her kids. "I once took Sarah to Roosevelt High School to see its metal detectors and security guards," she says. "I wanted to scare her into appreciation for what she has at Sidwell." It's not just safety, either. According to the latest test scores, fewer than half of Roosevelt's students are proficient in reading or math.

That's the reality that the Parkers and 1,700 other low-income students face if Sen. Durbin and his allies get their way. And it points to perhaps the most odious of double standards in American life today: the way some of our loudest champions of public education vote to keep other people's children -- mostly inner-city blacks and Latinos -- trapped in schools where they'd never let their own kids set foot.

Maybe Obama isn't a George Wallace, after all; he's more like a Richard Nixon with a Sidwell Enemies List.

Wait--I've got it: Obama isn't George Wallace or Richard Nixon or even Lester Maddox. Apologies to all of them.

No, these voucherized students are runaways who have escaped the Union's Education Plantation. These Plantation Owners want their property back. Obama owes the Plantation Owners and does their bidding, fetching their missing property--but it's not corrupting in any way!

Obama thinks he Lincoln, but with the thoughts he's been thinkin', he's more like Lincoln's nemesis: Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, Democrat and Dred Scott's Slave-Catcher-in-Chief.

You kids will learn all about it in American History class, so stay in school.

If you can.

OR TRASH

to be taken out?

"In response, once a week Hoye stood quietly outside Family Planning Specialists with a sign that said, "Jesus loves you and your baby. Let us help." When people approached the clinic, Hoye would ask their permission to speak with them about abortion alternatives; he also offered them pamphlets describing available help.

In 2007, pro-abortion clinic "escorts" began to show up in groups, surrounding Hoye and impeding his movement. They blocked his sign with sheets of blank cardboard and shouted down his low-key offers of help. When that didn't scare Hoye off, clinic managers lobbied the Oakland city council and in December 2007, the council instituted a "bubble-zone" ordinance applicable within a 100-foot radius of any Oakland abortion clinic. The law made it a crime to "approach within eight feet of any person seeking to enter" a "reproductive health care facility" in order to offer literature, display a sign, or engage in "oral protest, education, or counseling."

"This law is horribly unconstitutional," Hoye said. "It allows abortion clinics to decide which U.S. citizens are allowed to retain their constitutional right to free speech."

Represented by Life Legal Defense Fund (LLDF), Hoye challenged the ordinance in court. The case is still pending, but in May 2008, Oakland public attorneys acting in cooperation with clinic managers charged Hoye with "unlawful approaches" to women, and "force, threat of force, or physical obstruction."

What prosecutors did not know was that LLDF attorneys possessed four hours of uncut videotape documenting Hoye's activities outside the clinic on the dates in question. At trial in January 2009, the tapes impeached the testimony of clinic director Jackie Barbic, who claimed that Hoye repeatedly broke the 8-foot rule and that she and a patient had to put up their hands to fend him off. Instead, the tapes showed Hoye standing still as Barbic approached him; then they showed Hoye walking away. No incident shown on the tape matched Barbic's testimony, and even clinic escorts testified that Hoye was always cordial and never obstructed anyone's path or used threats or force.

Inexplicably, the jury still found Hoye guilty. At sentencing, the prosecutor recommended the probation and the clinic stay-away order—or two years in jail. When Hoye refused the stay-away order, Judge Hing appeared "surprised," Hoye said. "The judge was essentially asking me to stop trying to help men and women outside an abortion clinic, and I just would not voluntarily give up my First Amendment rights."

In February, Hing levied a sentence of 30 days and Hoye reported to the Santa Rita jail a month later. After the newspaper-reading inmate touted the Tribune article to the other prisoners—many of them inner-city drug dealers whose highest aspiration was to stay out of prison, they clamored to know why a man would choose jail over freedom. From that moment on, Hoye found himself in constant demand.

"I would be holding court with about 30 guys, explaining why I did what I did," he said. "I explained what an abortion actually does, that it takes an innocent human life. We held prayer vigils, we had Bible studies. I must have counseled and mentored guys all day and all night. It got to the point where we started talking seriously about Christ."

JUDGES 1:1

14 Now it happened, when she came to him, that she urged him to ask her father for a field. And she dismounted from her donkey, and Caleb said to her, "What do you wish?" 15 So she said to him, "Give me a blessing; since you have given me land in the South, give me also springs of water."

And Caleb gave her the upper springs and the lower springs.

“For the life of me, I just don’t know how Castro can seem cute after 40 years of torturing people.”--Rep. Lincoln Diaz-Balart, R.-Florida

THAT EXPLAINS IT!

Justice Stephen Breyer:

"In my experience when I was 8 or 10 or 12 years old, you know, we did take our clothes off once a day, we changed for gym, OK? And in my experience, too, people did sometimes stick things in my underwear."

AND TAX AND TAX AND TAX AND...

The energy of John McCormack:

Minnesota Republican Michelle Bachmann faced harsh criticism after citing the $3,100 figure in an April 7 Minneapolis Star-Tribune op-ed. "Bachmann: I, Too, Know More About Climate Change Than MIT Scientist," sneered one headline at the website TPM. "Whether Bachmann is ignorant or dishonest is unclear," wrote The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen.

When the Star-Tribune's opinion page editor Eric Ringham was contacted about Bachmann's use of the figure, he apologized for letting her include it in her column. "It wasn't on my radar. I'm embarrassed to have let it go unchallenged," Ringham told Think Progress. "You can rest assured this study is never going to be represented in the paper again without...confirmation it's being accurately portrayed."

"Rest assured!"-- My, how the sniffy sniff. One problem, though: Michelle Bachmann IS smarter than an MIT scientist when it comes to the cost of Captain Tax's Cap n' Tax energy rationing plan.

MIT professor John Reilly admitted that his original estimate of cap and trade's cost was inaccurate. The annual cost would be "$800 per household", he wrote. "I made a boneheaded mistake in an excel spread sheet. I have sent a new letter to Republicans correcting my error (and to others)." ...

Reilly assumes that the $3,128 will be "returned" to each household. Without that assumption, Reilly wrote, "the cost would then be the Republican estimate [$3,128] plus the cost I estimate [$800]."

So if anything, the lovely Mrs. Bachmann's figure was low--Obama's vanity costs $4,000 per family. And it was the press. not Mrs. Bachmann, who was "arrogant and ignorant".

"Under my plan of a cap and trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket."--Pres. Afternoon D.-Lite

"Government can't tax things like businesses or corporations, it can only tax people. When it says it's going to 'make business pay,' it is really saying it is going to make business help it collect taxes."--Pres. Morning in America

Now that's the kind of energy we need today.

IF YOU CAN STOMACH IT

Natan Sharansky: The View from the Gulag

Q: Were there any particular Reagan moments that you can recall being sources of strength or encouragement to you and your colleagues?

A: I have to laugh. People who take freedom for granted, Ronald Reagan for granted, always ask such questions. Of course! It was the great brilliant moment when we learned that Ronald Reagan had proclaimed the Soviet Union an Evil Empire before the entire world. There was a long list of all the Western leaders who had lined up to condemn the evil Reagan for daring to call the great Soviet Union an evil empire right next to the front-page story about this dangerous, terrible man who wanted to take the world back to the dark days of the Cold War. This was the moment. It was the brightest, most glorious day. Finally a spade had been called a spade. Finally, Orwell's Newspeak was dead. President Reagan had from that moment made it impossible for anyone in the West to continue closing their eyes to the real nature of the Soviet Union.

Now imgaine that you're a political prisoner in a Chavez prison this week...

Update:
Jay Nordlinger:

"Mutual respect?" What is there about the Iranian regime to respect? They stone girls to death for the crime of having been gang-raped. Think about that, if you can bear it. And, just a day before Obama sent his New Year’s message, we learned that a young Iranian blogger, Omid Mir Sayafi, had died in an Iranian prison: Evin, that torture chamber and graveyard for so many good people. Moreover, an American journalist, Roxana Saberi, is being held in that self-same prison. What will happen to her, we can only guess. ...

Reagan and Bush did the necessary in foreign policy: They dealt with despots and other unsavory elements when they had to...[b]ut they were conscious of a question: “How will it look to the boys in the camps?” They seldom forgot them. They understood that American foreign policy had to have a moral component, in order to be American.

FIRST, WE TRY ALL THE LAWYERS

from the previous administration, as if America were some Caudillo Presidente's junta-led People's Republic.

It's bad enough that intel officers are being sent this unmistakable message:

Do Not Stick Your Neck Out. Do Not Defend America. Do Not Connect the Dots. Do Not Hurt a Terrorist's Feelings. Return to Sept. 10, 2001, When We Couldn't Even Interrogate Zaccarias Moussaoui's Computer, Let Alone Moussaoui Himself.

Something about putting vicious butterflies in a terrorist's luxury suite makes Keith Olbermann and John Conyers want to conduct Nuremberg Trials for the Bush officials who have kept us safe.

Obama won't rule out prosecutions of lawyers who wrote opinions with which he disagrees. This MoveOn.prez won't move on.

Shall we take Supreme Court justices out behind the Court and administer beatings if they voted with the dissenting side? Sure; it's tempting. Very tempting. Very, very tempting. But its horrible policy.

Liberals--what kind of representation would your precious criminals get if their lawyers were subject to the same sentence upon losing the case?

If we're going down this road of prosecuting lawyers from the previous administration, then let's not stop at the Bush administration. If we're going there, then fairness dictates we start with...Eric Holder:

President Clinton had pardoned the fugitive financier on the recommendation of Holder, who was then deputy attorney general.

“Mr. Rich’s name was unfamiliar to me,” Holder told the Senate Judiciary Committee, under oath, on February 14, 2001. Despite this purported dearth of knowledge, Holder readily acceded to the request that he “facilitate a meeting” at which Quinn could try to persuade “the U.S. Attorney’s office to drop the charges.”

Holder’s testimony was rambling and often incredible. But he was consistent on the subject of his own ignorance.

...[Y]ears before the pardon scandal convinced him it was in his interest to make like he barely knew Rich’s name, Holder had bragged to the media about how his office was cracking down on Rich, an international fugitive who had duped the government out of loads of cash. Contrary to his congressional testimony that he’d never heard of Rich before 1999, Holder had unquestionably been aware of Rich’s name and history four years earlier; in fact, it was solely because of Rich that Holder extracted a $1.2 million settlement in a federal civil action.

Not only did Holder write the Marc Rich pardon, he perjured himself about the case before Congress.

You have the right to remain silent, Mr. Attorney General. And so does the president.

Try it sometime.

ps: Just pretend those Bush officials are Communist dictators you've been partying with. Communists really do torture people every day--yet we've heard not a peep from you moral giants.

SOMETHING IS WRONG WITH ME"--SAM & DAVE

Thanks to President Bush for making Obama stay away from the UN's "Durban II: Get the Jew" Racism Conference in Geneva. Obama claimed those thug governments were being "hypocritical"--that is, practicing policies just as bad as Israel's.

The only reason we're not there is because President Bush stood up to these cretins last time and refused to attend. After weeks of kowtowing to human rights abusers, even Pres. Barack "Dances With Dictators" Obama knows there are limits to the American people's disgust quotient with his non-stop groveling. For the US to attend now after having repudiated the first conference was more than this president was willing to take the heat for.

Tougherer, Smarterer(tm):

The Bush administration — while schizophrenic — went to the United Nations and won unilateral and near-unilateral sanctions demanding Iran suspend nuclear enrichment. This came after the IAEA had found Iran in noncompliance with its safeguards agreement. By agreeing to negotiate without enrichment suspension, the Obama administration is casting aside unilaterally these U.N. Security Council resolutions. Rather than facilitate diplomacy, such a move hampers it in the long-term because it signals to Tehran that it need not take U.N. Security Council Resolutions seriously. We can never use threat of U.N. sanctions again to coerce Iran.

Barack as "The Midnight Unilateral Cowboy". As weak as those sanctions were, they were far too tough for President Ladybug.

David Pryce-Jones' history lesson:

In 1935, a British nurse on secondment to a hospital in Frankfurt was walking home after duty. Uniformed Nazi storm-troopers waylaid her in the street and beat her up. Informing the British government, the British consul, Dr. Max Auwe, spelled out how serious this episode was. The fact that the storm-troopers were in uniform showed that they wished to be identified as acting for the Nazi regime. The Nazis wanted to find out whether the British would react strongly to such a provocation or cave in. When Dr. Auwe insisted on a policy of strength, he was fired from his post. Months later, the British government signed the Anglo-German Naval Treaty that gave Hitler his fleet and became the stepping-stone for the disastrous policy of appeasement. The failure to defend a British nurse who had been deliberately attacked, the Nazis rightly judged, signified that the British were in no frame of mind to defend the national interest, but could be pushed to make huge and devastating concessions.

So it is exactly with Roxana Saberi. The Iranians are testing the frame of mind in Washington. They have heard President Obama lamenting over past American policy, and offering change, indeed pleading for friendship. Negotiations are in the air. It is even being suggested that in the event of agreeing to negotiations the Iranians need not suspend their nuclear development, hitherto a condition for proposed talks. The mullahs are in the process of discovering whether Washington might be willing to make further concessions. Hillary Clinton has expressed “deep concern” over Roxana Saberi, and if weasel words of the kind are the sum total of Washington's response then the conclusion will be that the United States can be pushed into abandoning its national interest and instead pursuing a policy of appeasement of the mullahs, in spite of their warmongering quite as evidently as the Nazis.

If you think Pres. Toughie McTufftuff sent a message by standing up to those pirates, think again:

"...reliable military sources close to the scene are painting a much different picture of the incident – accusing the president of employing restrictive rules of engagement that actually hampered the rescue of Capt. Richard Phillips and extended the drama at sea for days.

Multiple opportunities to free the captain of the Maersk Alabama from three young pirates were missed, these sources say – all because a Navy SEAL team was not immediately ordered to the scene and then forced to operate under strict, non-lethal rules of engagement.

They say the response duty office at the Pentagon was initially unwilling to grant an order to use lethal force to rescue Phillips. They also report the White House refused to authorize deployment of a Navy SEAL team to the location for 36 hours, despite the recommendation of the on-scene commander.

The White House also turned down two rescue plans offered up by the Seal commander on the scene and the captain of the USS Bainbridge.

Our Navy stood up to the pirates in spite of Obama. Here's how its really done:

Stanly Kurtz:

But as Reagan's last secretary of state, George Shultz, once said, the most important foreign-policy decision Ronald Reagan ever made was to fire the striking air-traffic controllers. ...That incident, early in Reagan's first term, embodied his character, had an enormous and unanticipated effect on his foreign policy, and even foreshadowed the challenge we face right now. ...So the president bit the bullet and fired the striking controllers. That set the tone for labor negotiations with national, and even municipal, governments for years to come. More important, the whole world was watching Regan's conduct during the strike. This was obviously a man who would hang tough under pressure, and risk serious costs to back up a decision he believed to be necessary and right. The Soviet's took note.

Thomas Washburne:

On August 3, Reagan took just 29 seconds to explain his argument on national television:

“Let me read the solemn oath taken by each of these employees: ‘I am not participating in any strike against the government of the United States or any agency thereof.’ It is for this reason that I must tell those that fail to report for duty this morning that they are in violation of the law and if they do not report for work within 48 hours they have forfeited their rights and will be terminated.” ...

Many Americans admired Reagan’s handling of the situation, but the impact did not stop there. Edwin Meese, Reagan’s attorney general, has noted that this incident “convinced people in other capitals around the world, including Soviet leaders, that they had a person of real substance that they were dealing with here.” ...

August 3, 1981, could have been a very different day. Reagan could have appointed commissions. He could have passed the buck to Congress.

But instead, he did what he knew was right. In the present political world of instant polling, flip-flopping and blame-placing, we need to remember that real leadership comes from deeply embedded principles that can be tapped to tackle the serious issues confronting us as a nation, as a state or as a local community.

We need a leader who will stand up for America, stand up for Israel, stand up for our allies and stand up to thugs. So far, this this president stands up only for himself. When he's not bowing down to some slug with a flag somewhere.

"We are never defeated unless we give up on God."--Ronald Reagan

A MOUNTAIN OF DEBT?

Or the Message on the Mount:


24-25 "These words I speak to you are not incidental additions to your life, homeowner improvements to your standard of living. They are foundational words, words to build a life on. If you work these words into your life, you are like a smart carpenter who built his house on solid rock. Rain poured down, the river flooded, a tornado hit—but nothing moved that house. It was fixed to the rock.

26-27 "But if you just use my words in Bible studies and don't work them into your life, you are like a stupid carpenter who built his house on the sandy beach. When a storm rolled in and the waves came up, it collapsed like a house of cards."

28-29 When Jesus concluded his address, the crowd burst into applause. They had never heard teaching like this. It was apparent that he was living everything he was saying—quite a contrast to their religion teachers! This was the best teaching they had ever heard.

DA EXCITIN', EVER-GROWING NEWS-SUPPRESSION BUSINESS

Mark Steyn disreporting:

To the briefly famous Susan Roesgen of CNN, the parties are not safe for "family viewing." Which is presumably why the Boston Globe forbore to cover them last week. The original Boston Tea Party was so-called because it took place at Boston Harbor, which I gather is a harbor somewhere in the general vicinity of the Greater Boston area. So there would appear to be what I believe the journalism professors call a "local angle" to Wednesday's re-enactment. Might be useful for a publication losing a million bucks a week and threatened with closure by a parent company that, in one of the worst media acquisitions of all time, paid over $1 billion for a property that barely a decade later is all but worthless.

But I digress. Asked about the tea parties, President Barack Obama responded that he was not aware of them.

Of course he was unaware. After all, it wasn't in all the papers. It was just pure coincidence that the DHS Rightwing Menace Report was rushed out in time for the Tea Parties. Otherwise, we'd have to believe that Obama is a Fascist-Lite political hack for whom domestic terrorism is a mere political football. And that simply Cannot Be(tm).

As Marie Antoinette said, "Let them drink Lapsang Souchong." His Imperial Majesty at Barackingham Palace having declined to acknowledge the tea parties, his courtiers at the Globe and elsewhere fell into line. Talk-show host Michael Graham spoke to one attendee at the 2009 Boston Tea Party who remarked of the press embargo: "If Obama had been the king of England, the Globe wouldn't have covered the American Revolution."

But he would have given himself better gifts.

And bowed. Deeply.

...OR A ROCK ON OUR HOUSE?

At last--the White House released Obama's college transcript. No, not his grades; the transcript of his Georgetown University speech.

btw, do you know why his school records have never been released? It's not because of his grades--they were fine. It's top secret which radical courses he took: Sandanista Sandal-making, Bolshevist Biology, Engels English, etc. Nor does he wish to name the radical Communist professors who mentored him.

At Catholic Georgetown, Obama made the University cover up all of its religious symbols--after all, the first word in Messiah is "Me!" He wasn't always so picky, however: WaPo:

"The pamphlet has circulated in other primary states, and it always raises eyebrows for its overt appeal on religion. The words across the top read, "Faith. Hope. Change." Obama is pictured at a church pulpit, with a large illuminated cross in the background. A quote at the bottom reads, "My faith teaches me that I can sit in church and pray all I want, but I won't be fulfilling God's will unless I go out and do the Lord's work."

On the flip side is a photo of Obama in front of a stained glass window. A few paragraphs describe his work as a community organizer in Chicago, and tell of how some folks he met encouraged him to attend church one Sunday. "That day Obama felt a beckoning of the spirit and accepted Jesus Christ into his life." The words along the side read, "Committed Christian."

He used Christian symbols to help him get the job, but now that he's got it, he doesn't need those voters or those symbols--they just clutter up the view.

He quotes the Sermon on the Mount without mentioning Jesus' name. He claims his five economic pillars are America's New Foundation, the House built on the Rock, not upon the sand.

Obama's Sermon on the Me:

"There is a parable at the end of the Sermon on the Mount that tells the story of two men. The first built his house on a pile of sand, and it was destroyed as soon as the storm hit. But the second is known as the wise man, for when “…the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house…it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock.”

We cannot rebuild this economy on the same pile of sand. We must build our house upon a rock. We must lay a new foundation for growth and prosperity – a foundation that will move us from an era of borrow and spend to one where we save and invest; where we consume less at home and send more exports abroad. It’s a foundation built upon five pillars that will grow our economy and make this new century another American century...

I don't have a problem with metaphor..but I do have a problem using that metaphor to justify socialism.

He also blatantly rips off Ronald Reagan's "City on a Hill". Reagan used it to call America to freedom under God. Obama however, uses it as a call to free government from all restraint, to make government our new god:

"...way off in the distance, we can see a vision of an America’s future that is far different than our troubled economic past. It’s an America teeming with new industry and commerce; humming with new energy and discoveries that light the world once more. A place where anyone from anywhere with a good idea or the will to work can live the dream they’ve heard so much about.
It is that house upon the rock. Proud, sturdy, and unwavering in the face of the greatest storm. We will not finish it in one year or even many, but if we use this moment to lay that new foundation; if we come together blah blah blah..."

David Gelernter:

"In one of [Reagan's] favorite, best-remembered phrases, he told the world that America was and must always be the "shining city upon a hill." "The phrase comes from John Winthrop," he explained, "who wrote it to describe the America he imagined." Winthrop wrote those words aboard the Arbella bound for Massachusetts Bay in 1630: "We shall find that the God of Israel is among us," he wrote. "For we must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill, the eyes of all people are upon us." The phrase comes from Matthew 5:14 ("Ye are the light of the world. A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid"), and indirectly from the prophet Isaiah ("In the end of days it shall come to pass that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established as the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and many nations shall flow unto it"). Reagan's use of these words connected late-20th century America to the humane Christian vision, the Puritan vision, that created this nation."

If Ronald Reagan caught this little phony stealing his material to pimp Communism, he would kick his Marxist ass. In the spiritual sense, of course.

Obama's Five Pillars:

1.) New Regulations, by which he means a Command Economy. No more ups and downs. All-knowing, all-wise bureaucrats will flat-line our economy for us. Don't mind the 20% permanent unemployment like Europe.

2.) Education. Democrat unions have already run education into the ground--but this time, it will be different! Obama just kicked two minority kids out of his daughters' private school by taking away their vouchers. Democrats from George Wallace to Barack Obama just love to stand in the schoolhouse door telling minority children "Keep Out!"

And they've made colleges overpriced Marxist boot camps.

3.) Energy. Obama's Cap n' Trade is at once Environmental Extremism, Confiscatory Taxation, Mind-Numbing, Job-Killing Regulation, a Transfer of Power to Trans-National Bodies...and all the programs require $10 of taxpayer money to produce $1-worth of fuel. Forever.

4.) Health Care (with Tax Reform and Social Security Reform thrown in.) The reason it's so expensive already is because Democrats have driven up costs though regulation, legislative gifts to Big Lawsuit and cost-shifting: when government underpays, hospitals charge you and insurance companies more. Democrats have done this because they want to abolish private insurance and socialize doctors and patients. Helping the needy is one thing--confiscating 1/7th of the economy is another.

As for Tax reform and Social Security reform, just send in your entire paycheck and they'll let you know what you've got coming back. REFORMED!

5.) Deficit Spending. You're joking, right? This doesn't even merit snark, let alone a serious response.

These aren't a New Foundation; they are the dead weight of government crushing our national home. We can accomplish these goals where worthy through other means consistent with freedom.

For Obama, everything is government and government is everything.

That's not the Sermon on the Mount; it's a Mount on the Sermon.

Update: Dawn Patrol:

No mention of Jesus. It's just a parable about a house built upon a rock.

In Obama's hands, the words of Our Lord become just another way to tell the story of the Three Little Pigs.

ps: "Five Pillars"? Ring any bells?

PROVIDED BY BETTER MEN

Remember when you put that frog in your brother's bed or slipped a cricket down Susie's shirt? Never Again!

They called you "History's Greatest Monster!"...and it turns out, they were right! According to Barack "Orkin Man" Obama and Eric "Bugsy" Holder, you were a torturer!

The release of these secret memos bugs me:

“You [the CIA] would like to place Zubaydah in a cramped confinement box with an insect. You have informed us [the Department of Justice] that he appears to have a fear of insects. In particular, you would like to tell Zubaydah that you intend to place a stinging insect into the box with him. You would, however, place a harmless insect in the box. You have orally informed us that you would in fact place a harmless insect such as a caterpillar in the box with him.

If you do so ...you must inform him that the insects will not have a sting that would produce death or severe pain."

Obama has now banned the practice of putting bugs in a cage with humans. After all, the last time it happened, those "Fear Factor" contestants won a luxurious, all-expenses-paid trip to Vegas--and we know how the president feels about those.

We can drop a Predator on them...but we can't scare them? I told you he won't hurt their feelings.

By this standard, UNICEF trick-or-treaters shouting "Boo!" are war criminals. I mean, can we at least startle them? How 'bout popping a bag filled with air behind them? Too scary? Or leaving a flaming bag of excrement outside the cave and ringing the doorbell?

Speaking of, Obama wasn't bowing before his Saudi master; he was simply removing a small tick off of a larger one before someone accused him of violating the Geneva Conventions!

President Ladybug is telling the cockroaches of the world that he means them no harm.

Remember: "No Caterpillars at Gitmo...Or It's Butterflies at Nuremberg!"

CIA HEROES

Obama has promised he will no longer protect Americans by thwarting terrorist plots if it hurts the terrorists' feelings.

Atty. General Holder released the four Bush memos that
correctly allowed for waterboarding--Holder simply can't resist any opportunity to call America a state-sponsor of torture.

Eric the Brave should have recused himself since his law firm is representing 18 Gitmo detainees and he has a vested interest in seeing them go free.

"The President has halted the use of the interrogation techniques described in these opinions, and this administration has made clear from day one that it will not condone torture. We are disclosing these memos consistent with our commitment to the rule of law. It would be unfair to prosecute dedicated men and women working to protect America for conduct that was sanctioned in advance by the Justice Department."

That's really big of you, Eric; they're torturers--but dedicated!

On behalf of the Americans around here, we think the "dedicated men and women working to protect America" should never have been under any threat of prosecution at all. Period.

So thank you all for doing a difficult job, breaking up terror plots and keeping me and my family, my neighbors and countrymen safe from harm in the face of both dangerous killers and the ingratitude and moral grandstanding of useless politicians.

Thank you for doing your duty. You all deserve medals.

COURAGE TAKES A HOLIDAY

Fox News (who unlike all the other brave, "Truth to Power" networks, refused to be limited to asking just one question of Sec. of Political Security Janet Napolitano):

"To the extent veterans read it as an accusation ... an apology is owed."

That is not an apology, but a refusal to apologize.

"...she told FOX News that the report's reference to the Oklahoma City bombing "rang true" to her.

"Unfortunately [McVeigh] was a vet, that's where he got his training and so when I was told about the report, it rang true with me, this has happened in the past," Napolitano told FOX News.

That's the best defense of racial profiling I've heard in quite a while, Madame Secretary--or in this case, military profiling.

Given the record of Democrats who have leaked secrets to America's enemies, it's beyond ludicrous for an administration chock full o' security risks to label veterans as potentially dangerous.

The only recent case of veteran terrorism that comes to mind is the Muslim soldier who fragged his officers. Shall we profile Muslim soldiers, too?

There are more Democrat officials in jail for mopery on park benches than veterans in for terrorism. Yet we don't write reports that suggest that Democrat officials are potential pervs. Maybe we should reconsider.

What's that? I've gone too far this time? Okay, okay:

To the extent Democrat officials read it as an accusation, an apology is owed.

THE SHOE ON THE OTHER LEFT FOOT

Leftwing extremism in the United States can be broadly divided into those groups, movements, and adherents that are primarily hate-oriented (based on hatred of particular religious, racial or ethnic groups), and those that are mainly anti-Constitutional, rejecting state or local authority in favor of federal or even UN authority, or rejecting government authority entirely. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as promoting abortion or the complete dissolution of our borders.

Leftwing extremists are harnessing this historical election as a recruitment tool. Many leftwing extremists were antagonistic toward the previous presidential administration and its perceived stance on a range of issues, including immigration and citizenship, the expansion of social programs to minorities, and restrictions on firearms ownership and use. Leftwing extremists are increasingly galvanized by these concerns and leverage them as drivers for recruitment. From the 2008 election timeframe to the present, leftwing extremists have capitalized on related racial and political prejudices in expanded propaganda campaigns, thereby reaching out to a wider audience of potential sympathizers.

Leftwing extremist chatter on the Internet continues to focus on the economy, the perceived loss of U.S. jobs in the manufacturing and construction sectors, and home foreclosures. Anti-Semitic extremists attribute these losses to a deliberate conspiracy conducted by a cabal of Jewish “financial elites.” These “accusatory” tactics are employed to draw new recruits into leftwing extremist groups and further radicalize those already subscribing to extremist beliefs. DHS/I&A assesses this trend is likely to accelerate if the economy is perceived to worsen.

Over the past five years, various leftwing extremists, including terror cells and brown supremacists, have adopted the immigration issue as a call to action, rallying point,
and recruiting tool. Debates over appropriate immigration levels and enforcement policy generally fall within the realm of protected political speech under the First Amendment, but in some cases, pro-immigration or strident anti-enforcement fervor has been directed against specific groups and has the potential to turn violent.

DHS/I&A assesses that leftwing extremists will attempt to recruit and radicalize returning veterans in order to exploit their skills and knowledge derived from military training and combat. These skills and knowledge have the potential to boost the capabilities of extremists—including lone wolves or small terrorist cells—to carry out violence. The willingness of a small percentage of military personnel to join extremist groups during the 1990s because they were disgruntled, disillusioned, or suffering from the psychological effects of war is being replicated today.

DHS/I&A will be working with its state and local partners over the next several months to ascertain with greater regional specificity the rise in leftwing extremist activity in the United States, with a particular emphasis on the political, economic, and social factors that drive leftwing extremist radicalization.

...............

How will you know this dangerous and unpatriotic leftwing extremism? Look for danger signs like these:

* smearing veterans as dangerous while releasing terrorists into the USA
* forcing Americans to pay for the aborting of foreign babies
* takeovers of entire indutries by the government
* billions of taxpayer dollars to fund a private army of permanent paid "volunteer" campaign workers
* the seizure of radio stations by subterfuge to silence political opponents
* violence and intimidation by the losers of state traditional marriage propositions
* allowing uncontrolled illegal immigration while targeting those who enforce the law
* expanding every questionable function of the government except its unquestionable primary function: national defense, which would be slashed

and finally,

*you'll recognize leftwing extremism when government departments adopt the standards of banana republics and start putting out hack propaganda documents just in time for the Tea Parties, demonizing half the citizenry as potential Enemies of the State.

If you should see any of this, report it to Homeland Security at once!

FROM HIS NEW SUBJECTS IN AMERICA

All Hail SOG!

Saladations to you, O King of Linens 'n Things, and blessed be the Pools of Petrol on which you Perch.

As an arrogant and derisive American, I implore and implode you on behead and behalf of your American subjects and their "leader", President B. Hussein Obama-Lite, Jr.

As you well know, despite the fierce, warlike rhetoric of our Attorney Corporal Eric "I don't know what would come next" Holder, the Somali Pirates have inexplicably attacked another American vessel.

The Prophet Biden (Plagiary Be Upon Him) predicted that President Obama would be tested severely, but no one suspected it would come from three Bedouin bass fishermen with a bad attitude and an Evinrude.

I impeach and impugn Your Tackiness to grant your humble, groveling servant President Lite, Jr. permission to attack these pirates.

And this time, could we use real lead-based paint instead of Easter Egg dye in the paintball guns? Given time, elevated lead levels can lead to some really serious health complications for these evildoers!

As your sandal-rubbing servant, our president will not defend America without Your Fraudulency's permission. So please hear our arrogant and derisive petitions, O Your Thick Tick-ness and allow your servant Barack to do his job. for once.

UPDATE: Nevermind, Your Omnivorence; our commanders took matters into their own hands. Congrats to both crews and especially to Capt. Phillips, who by diving in the water also rescued an innocent bystander. Great news for a great Easter!

NO JUSTICE...

"It yet remains a problem to be solved in human affairs, whether any free government can be permanent, where the public worship of God, and the support of religion, constitute no part of the policy or duty of the state in any assignable shape."--Justice Joseph Story

...no Peace.

PARTIES LIKE IT'S 1773

"Sam Adams writes the letters (to the newspapers) and John Hancock pays the postage."--common joke of the day

"Well boys, you have had a fine, pleasant evening for your Indian caper, haven't you? But mind, you have got to pay the fiddler yet!"--British Admiral Montague to the Sons of Liberty

"Death is more eligible than slavery. A free-born people are not required by the religion of Jesus Christ to submit to tyranny, but may make use of such power as God has given them to recover and support their liberties...We implore the Ruler above the skies that He would bare His arm...and let Israel go."--the men of Marlborough, Massachusetts, Dec. 16, 1773

I pity the fool who doesn't know his Tea Party history, especially in this Tea Party season, so here's a thumbnail:

"While American merchants paid taxes, British allowed the East India Tea Company to sell a half million pounds of tea in the Colonies with no taxes, giving them a monopoly by underselling American merchants. Disguised as Mohawk Indians, a band of patriots called Sons of Liberty, led by Sam Adams, left the South Meeting House toward Griffin's Wharf, boarded the ships Dartmouth, Eleanor and Beaver, and threw 342 chests of tea into the harbor."

But it wasn't just about taxation without representation. This law was a British effort to defund and silence the opposition from Hancock and Adams, like an out-of-control legislature trying to strip away an opponent's radio stations on orders of the King. It was interference in the market for political purposes like a government takeover of car companies. East India was a well-connected quasi-governmental entity that lobbied the legislature, even paying off the Chief Magistrate, just as Fannie and Freddie made Obama their biggest campaign cash recipient.

One of our best historical sources is A Retrospect of the Boston Tea-Party, With a Memoir of George R. T. Hewes, a survivor of the little band of patriots who drowned the tea in Boston harbour in 1773" written by "A Citizen of New York" in 1834, sixty years after the event.

The Last of the Tea Partiers George Hewes on the Boston Massacre:

"On that day, one of the British officers applied to a barber, to be shaved and dressed ; the master of the shop, whose name was Pemont, told his apprentice boy he might serve him, and receive the pay to himself, while Pemont left the shop. The boy accordingly served him, but the officer, for some reason unknown to me, went away from the shop without paying him for his service.

After the officer had been gone some time, the boy went to the house where he was, with his account, to demand payment of his bill, but the sentinel, who was before the door, would not give him admittance, nor permit him to see the officer ; and as some angry words were interchanged between the sentinel and the boy, a considerable number of the people from the vicinity, soon gathered at the place where they were, which was in King Street, and I was soon on the ground among them.

On the Massacre trial:

"...I was called as one of the witnesses, on the part of the government, and testified, that I believed it was the same man, Captain Preston, that ordered his soldiers to make ready, who also ordered them to fire. Mr. John Adams, former president of the United States, was advocate for the prisoners, and denied the fact, that Captain Preston gave orders to his men to fire; and on his cross examination of me, asked whether my position was such, that I could see the captain's lips in motion when the order to fire was given; to which I answered, that I could not."

On the Tea Party:

"When the committee returned and informed the meeting of the absence of the governor, there was a confused murmur among the members, and the meeting was immediately dissolved, many of them crying out "Let every man do his duty, and be true to his country!" and there was a general huzza for Griffin's Wharf.

It was now evening, and I immediately dressed myself in the costume of an Indian, equipped with a small hatchet, which I and my associates denominated the tomahawk, with which, and a club, after having painted my face and hands with coal dust in the shop of a blacksmith, I repaired to Griffin's Wharf, where the ships lay that contained the tea. When I first appeared in the street, after being thus disguised, I fell in with many who were dressed, equipped and painted as I was, and who fell in with me, and marched in order to the place of our destination."

On the British Occupation:

"I made my escape in my fishing boat, together with two other men, who were with me in the same boat. In thus making my escape, I was much gratified to realize the apprehensions of Admiral Graves, who, when I proposed to subject myself to his fishing regulations, observed to me, that he knew from my countenance, I intended to run away and told me that as sure as I did, if ever he retook me, he would hang me up at the yard arm, in twenty-four hours. But he has not been gratified with a sight of me since I made my escape."

Once upon a time, Americans were considered to be "pirates":

"I had fully resolved to take a privateering cruise, and when I informed my wife of my fixed resolution, and requested her to have my clothes in readiness in a short time, by a day appointed, although she was greatly afflicted at the prospect of our separation, and my absence from a numerous family of children, who needed a father's parental care, she without a murmur reluctantly complied with my request. ...

I then pursued my route to Providence, in Rhode Island, and on my arrival there, immediately stipulated with Captain Thomas Stacy to go with him on a cruise of seven weeks. When that term had expired, and we had seen no enemy during the time, we were discouraged, and threatened to mutiny, unless he would return, as we had served out the time for which we had stipulated. The captain then promised us, that if we would continue with him one week longer, provided we did not see any thing during that time, he would return to which we assented.

The next Sunday after, we espied a large ship, which we took to be a British frigate. We were ordered to down sails and go to fishing, thereby to deceive them; and when she came by us, she took us to be only a fisherman. After she had passed us, our captain said to us, "My boys, if you will stand by me, we will take that ship!" ...

While we were in Charleston, the governor of South Carolina informed us, that the British had two vessels off the bar, that had taken thirty-four of our vessels; and proposed to us to go out on a five days cruise in pursuit of them. Our captain put it to vote, and it was found we were unanimously agreed to make the cruise. A number of gentlemen from Charleston proposed to accompany us on the cruise, to which we readily assented. We sailed about one o'clock in the afternoon of the day that the pilot carried us over the bar.

After we got out, the captain ordered one man to the foretopmast head to look out, and another also at the head of the maintopmast. In less than an hour after, the man at the foretopmast espied a sail. Our captain asked him what she was. He could net tell for the distance. The man at the maintopmast cried out at the same time, another sail; and we soon came so near to them, that we discovered them to be two sloops; and the men at mast head said they were the two sloops that had been cruising, and told captain Smedly he would have his belly full of them.

"House all your guns, boys," said our captain to his men; "Shut all your port-holes fast, and hide yourselves, all except just enough to work the ship." The sloops were about a mile ahead of us. They were the Vengeance, and the Wilful Murderer.

The sloop Wilful Murderer came up along side, and hailed "Ahoy! The ship ahoy! From whence came you?"
"From South Carolina," says our captain.
"Where are you bound?" they inquired.
"Alongside you, you rascals! Out guns, boys! Haul down your colours, or I will sink you instantly!" says our captain; "Round too, and come under my stern!"

.............

The author, "A Citizen of New York", then recounts some revolutionary history. Instead of Obama's Comm-Unity, we need the Continental's Unity today:

On the first of August, 211 Boston merchants and traders agreed, that for one year from the last day of the present year, they would not send for or import, either on their own account or on commission, or purchase of any that may import any kind of merchandize from Great Britain, except coal, salt, and some articles necessary for the fisheries, nor import any tea, glass, paper or colours, until the acts imposing duties on those articles were repealed. ...
It was about this time that the luxury of tea was first proscribed in Boston, when two hundred families in that town agreed to abstain entirely from the use of it by a certain day, the 6th of October then next following; other towns followed the example, and entered into similar agreements. The students of Harvard College were highly applauded, for resolving, with a spirit becoming Americans, to use no more of that pernicious herb...

Finally-- patriotic college students--yes!

The author closes:

It is true, that the same sun that warms the earth, and decks the field with flowers, thaws out the serpent in his den, and concocts his poison. So in the sunshine of great national prosperity, the greatest political evils may be engendered.

Should that time arrive, when, in the agitations of the public mind, we may be threatened with the same disasters which have heretofore befallen the republics which have gone before us, our civil constitution may still save us, provided we are influenced by the example, and animated by the spirit of the heroes who purchased it, and of the sages by whose wisdom and virtue it was formed and adopted. That spirit and that wisdom only can preserve it.

That spirit which is designated by the degrading and odious name of party cannot save us; it is that which creates dissentions, and entails misery and ruin on republics ; it is that which we have been told by our greatest political benefactor [ He means Geo. Washington--Ed.], that has in other times and countries, perpetrated the most horrid enormities, and is itself a
frightful despotism.

If we expect to be saved by our civil constitution, and secure for liberty an immortal existence, we must be inspired with that spirit which in the best days of Roman glory, could yield every thing to country, and identify with her, its own individual interest. We must be governed in our political conduct, by that spirit which is appropriately designated by no other, than the hallowed name of American; that spirit which inspired the desperate courage, and exalted the patriotism of the Boston Tea Party.

See you at the Tea Party.

GOOD HOPE

"Jesus sought me when a stranger
Wandering from the fold of God
He, to rescue me from danger,
Interposed His precious blood"
--"Come Thou Fount of Ev’ry Blessing”

Doctrine Bears Repeating

Evangelicals need to brush up on basic Christian teachings.

Charles Colson with Anne Morse:

"We have now sunk to a depth at which restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men." Written in 1939, George Orwell's words might well be addressed to the leaders of today's biblically illiterate church.

The most obvious thing to be said about Christianity is that it rests on historic facts: the Creation, the Incarnation, and the Resurrection. Since our doctrines are truth claims, they cannot be mere symbolism. This is important to remember as we celebrate the Resurrection, which is often clouded by the pageantry of Easter. ...

Some years ago, I visited Athens and mounted the slippery rock called Mars Hill. At the top, I stood where I imagined Paul had confronted the Areopagus, the wise men of the cultural center of the world. Paul challenged them by referring to their own literature and false altars, and then boldly proclaimed the gospel, concluding that God had raised Jesus from the dead.

It's the same message I preach in prisons today. I think it's far more exhilarating to stand on a belief that has survived 2,000 years of persecution than to flit from one fad to another.

Few people accepted Paul's invitation that day to follow Christ. But billions have followed him ever since, because Christ has an unstoppable power. He has the power to break Satan's hold on our souls and joyfully transform our lives.

Orwell was right: In a crisis, we often have a duty to restate the obvious. And Easter is a good time for Christians to remind their doctrinally confused brethren of the obvious truths of Christianity.

The greatest challenge for serious Christians today is not re-inventing Christianity, but rediscovering its core teachings.

Break Point:

...Jesus opened up the minds of the disciples to see all the things that had been foretold about Him in the Scriptures. Jesus—He who enjoyed the deepest level of intimacy with the Father—showed us how to put our hope in God by trusting in the Word of God.

The hope this gave Him enabled Him to endure what followed: the mockery, the scourging, the hammer, the lance, and the abandonment. Christ showed us hope transformed into sacrificial love. And as He was crushed under the weight of the sins of the world, the fragrance of His gift goes up to God as the perfect—the most pleasing—of any sacrifice.

And just as had been foretold, on the third day Christ did rise from the grave. He broke the chains of the captive. He set the prisoners free by conquering death and sin.

As Christians, we have no reason to lack hope. Christ has shown the trustworthiness of God and of His Word.

Having seen that God loved us enough that He did not spare even His own Son, how can we lack for hope today, even in these bleak times? Christ became for us both the basis of our hope, and our ultimate example of hope.

As we celebrate Easter this coming Sunday, I want to challenge you to, in these tough times, make a point to live in light of that tremendous resurrection hope.

Be joyful. Love beyond what is reasonable. Be bold. And endure. You are not like those who have no hope. You live on the other side of the Resurrection.

Have a glorious Easter!

NIGHTIE NEWS HOUR

With your host Brooke Forest Stone Willow Bay River Rock Paper Scissors Felsen-Feltcher:

*(Versailles, France) Obama administration officials bizarrely claimed that the president did not bow before King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia.

"Those reports that the President kissed the King's feet so tenderly that even Dick Morris began to feel those old, familiar stirrings are patently untrue," said White House spokesman Mekka Hadj. "The president had simply misplaced his Blackberry and was patting down the Potentate in hopes of locating it. However, all he found was some expensive silverware. Also two servant boys named "Chas" and "Freeman". And a pork shoulder, an ornate Bedouin "two-humper" camel saddle, an empty whisky bottle and an F-18 Saddam buried in the sand during the first Gulf War and evidently forgot about."

*(Washington, D.C.) The Obama Cabinet has gotten it's latest member; the New Transparency Czar.

Due to the mandatory tax issues, however, the Czar declined to be named publicly .

"We feel that "Czar X" will help us keep the president's promise to run "the most open administration in history'," said an unnamed high administration official who would only speak to us on conditions of anonymity involving surreptitious late-night meetings, dead drops and chalk markings on lampposts in front of his home at the vice-president's mansion.

From his new office at an undisclosed location, 'Czar X' promised to create a Transparency Website and 1-800-Transparency Hotline available to everyone on a need-to-know basis.

*(The Parker Brothers Memorial Monopoly Money Treasury Building) Treasury Secretary Geithner announced that after taking over the housing industry, the banking industry, the financial industry, the car industry, the health care and energy industries, the communications and entertainment industries, the government will next turn its attentions to other major sectors of the economy.

"We will be extending TARP coverage to garage sales, lemonade stands, bake sales, free-range ferret trappers and soy-based dry-cleaners," said the Secretary. "With the exception of Montana's dental floss ranches, these are the last remaining businesses in America not yet run by our cool and steady yet nimble and catlike government experts."

*(The Horn Section of Africa) The Somali Pirates released their list of demands today through their agent Mekka Hadj at the William Morris Talent Agency.

They demanded mortgage bailouts for their subprime hovels back in Mogadishu, that Jon Bon Jovi perform a free Pirate Aid concert in Burning Tire Park, full cable access to the Fox anchor-babes, that the president bow down before their leader, and that the U.S. government re-open the humane and compassionate facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba at once.

The White House is reportedly ready to comply with all the demands except the one about Fox News.

"Fox News is where we draw the line." said an angry yet unidentified Transparency Czar. "All we're waiting for now is King Abdullah's permission."

*In Sports, soccer is still a game for girls.

SELL OUT

Rush Limbaugh: "I hope Obama fails!"
Fidel Castro: "I hope Obama succeeds!"

Rep. Laura Richardson, D., Grand Theft Auto, California:

"What really was amazing to me as he leaned in, he looked directly into our eyes -- uh, quite aware of what was happening, and said -- and said to us, how can we help? "How can we help President Obama?"

Rep. Bobby Rush, D., Chicago Machine:

He was a down-to-earth kind of man who I thought resembled someone who I would say is as close as a neighbor

Yes--if your neighbor keeps political prisoners in his crawl-space.

-- and he had a very modest home.

and billions looted from his subjects in Swiss banks.

And we were met in the front door by his lovely wife. So it was almost like visiting an old friend, uh, when we visited with him. He wanted to know more about Dr. King."

Because there's been a total news blackout on Dr. King since he was killed 40 years ago. No books, no movies, no nothing.

I'll tell you about Dr. King; he worked to get civil rights for all Americans just as Castro denies civil rights to all Cubans except his henchmen.

Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, D., Potemkin Villas, USSA:

"We’ve been led to believe that the Cuban people are not free, and they are repressed by a vicious dictator, and I saw nothing to match what we’ve been told.”

"All the Block Captains assured me that no one in the neighborhoods complain!"

What Cleaver is really saying is that if Obama sucessfully establishes the Socialist Paradise here, Cleaver will gladly sell us out, too.

Shame on these tools.

"Christianity alone has felt that God, to be wholly God, must have been a rebel as well as a king. Alone of all creeds, Christianity has added courage to the virtues of the Creator. For the only courage worth calling courage must necessarily mean that the soul passes a breaking point - and does not break."--G.K. Chesterton

"When a business or an individual spends more than it makes, it goes bankrupt. When government does it, it sends you the bill. And when government does it for 40 years, the bill comes in two ways: higher taxes and inflation. Make no mistake about it, inflation is a tax and not by accident." --Ronald Reagan

"We lived in freedom, we lived lives that were a statement, not an apology."--Ronald Reagan

Imagine a Hollywood liberal, planning an anti-nuke rally with all his liberal overpaid actor pals while the president is trying to protect the nation. Ho hum--happens all the time, right? It happened to Reagan when he was president. But it also nearly happened to Harry Truman.

Except that time, the anti-nuclear activist was...Ronald Reagan!

"IN DECEMBER 1945, Ronald Reagan almost helped lead a mass anti- nuclear rally in Hollywood, California..."--Paul Lettow, "Ronald Reagan and His Quest to Abolish Nuclear Weapons"

Rich Lowry:

"Paul Lettow has found the purloined letter of the Reagan presidency: the fact that much of his Cold War policy was driven by a desire to eliminate all nuclear weapons. This aspect of Reagan is part of the public record but has so far been hidden in plain view because it doesn't seem to fit his conservatism and seems so otherwise outlandish.
... Missile defense did not, of course, lead to the end of all nuclear arms, but by contributing to the Soviet crack-up it helped achieve the next best thing: the end of the nuclear balance of terror as we had known it for 40 years."

Closing Velocity:

*Total cuts in missile defense: $1.4 billion or roughly 15%.
*Cancel second Airborne Laser (ABL) aircraft, keep the one remaining ABL prototype as a testbed and revert to pure R&D.
*No increases in Ground-based Interceptor (GBI) deployment in Alaska. Remaining silos will stay unfilled. European GBIs will be decided on later during the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR).
*Termination of the Multiple Kill Vehicle (MKV) program. As you recall, MKV just recently had a well, awesome, test..."

Ronald Reagan's "Star Wars" speech:

When I took office in January 1981, I was appalled by what I found: American planes that couldn't fly and American ships that couldn't sail for lack of spare parts and trained personnel and insufficient fuel and ammunition for essential training.

I know that all of you want peace and so do I. I know too that many of you seriously believe that a nuclear freeze would further the cause of peace. But a freeze now would make us less, not more, secure and would raise, not reduce, the risks of war. It would be largely unverifiable and would seriously undercut our negotiations on arms reduction. It would reward the Soviets for their massive military buildup while preventing us from modernizing our aging and increasingly vulnerable forces. With their present margin of superiority, why should they agree to arms reductions knowing that we were prohibited from catching up?...

But we must not be misled by those who would make defense once again the scapegoat of the Federal budget. ...
Wouldn't it be better to save lives than to avenge them? Are we not capable of demonstrating our peaceful intentions by applying all our abilities and our ingenuity to achieving a truly lasting stability? I think we are - indeed, we must! ...

What if free people could live secure in the knowledge that their security did not rest upon the threat of instant U.S. retaliation to deter a Soviet attack; that we could intercept and destroy strategic ballistic missiles before they reached our own soil or that of our allies?

I clearly recognize that defensive systems have limitations and raise certain problems and ambiguities. If paired with offensive systems, they can be viewed as fostering an aggressive policy and no one wants that.

But with these considerations firmly in mind, I call upon the scientific community in our country, those who gave us nuclear weapons to turn their great talents now to the cause of mankind and world peace: to give us the means of rendering these nuclear weapons impotent and obsolete.

The Washington Times:

The United States and Russia have radically reduced their nuclear arsenals, from a peak of more than 70,000 warheads during the Cold War to 3,900 today. However, this drawdown was not accomplished through formal arms control; it was the natural consequence of reduced tensions after the collapse of communism. ...

Jonah Goldberg asks...:

Obama says the continued existence of so many nukes amounts to "the most dangerous legacy of the Cold War." I'm not so sure. ...
Some might say the military-industrial complex or the national-security state. But not me. To me, the most obvious dangerous legacy of the Cold War would have to be the damage the Soviets did to the world. ...
I mean the relentless distortion of the truth, the psychological violence they visited on the West and the World via their useful idiots and their agents. I'm thinking not merely of the intellectual corruption of the American Left (which even folks like Richard Rorty had to concede), but the corruption of reformers and their movements around the globe. Soviet propaganda still contaminates, while nuclear fallout does not. Lies about America, the West, and the nature of democratic capitalism live on throughout the third world and in radioactive pockets on American campuses.

...and Mark Steyn answers:

The wish for "a world without nuclear weapons" is not merely a pacifist delusion but one that obliquely subscribes to the false equivalence so assiduously promoted during the Cold War. ...It's the regime. North Korea and Iran going nuclear is not the same as Norway and St. Lucia going nuclear. ...
It's not just embarassing to hear the so-called "leader of the free world" talking like a 14-year old who's been up in his room listening to "Imagine" for too long. I fear this presidency has the makings of global tragedy.

Rich Lowry:

The meme in the press was how the test launch made Obama’s disarmament speech all the more “urgent.” It really makes it all the more childish and dangerous. In setting the goal of “Global Zero” (the program of universal disarmament that sounds a little like a new international Coke product), Obama hitched himself to a project as utopian as Pres. George W. Bush’s ambition to end tyranny in the world.

In fact, they are essentially the same goal. The bipartisan congressional Strategic Posture Review concluded in an interim report that to achieve Global Zero would require a “fundamental transformation of the world political order.” All significant geo-political conflicts would have to end, and all untrustworthy governments disappear. The verification regime would have to be so all-encompassing as to constitute a kind of world government.

The Obama administration thinks Global Zero serves a hardheaded purpose against rogue states. The theory is that our arsenal makes us nuclear hypocrites. Only by pursuing its elimination do we gain the moral standing to pressure other nations to give up their nuclear ambitions.

This is a misreading of the calculations that drive states to seek nuclear programs, and of human nature. If we had zero weapons, there would be even more of a premium on other states’ acquiring nukes, for purposes of protection, power-projection, and prestige.

WSJ:

The President went even further in Prague, noting that "as a nuclear power — as the only nuclear power to have used a nuclear weapon — the United States has a moral responsibility to act." That barely concealed apology for Hiroshima is an insult to the memory of Harry Truman, who saved a million lives by ending World War II without a bloody invasion of Japan. As for the persuasive power of "moral authority," we should have learned long ago that the concept has no meaning in Pyongyang or Tehran, much less in the rocky hideouts of al Qaeda.

The truth is that Mr. Obama's nuclear vision has reality exactly backward. To the extent that the U.S. has maintained a large and credible nuclear arsenal, it has prevented war, defeated the Soviet Union, shored up our alliances and created an umbrella that persuaded other nations that they don't need a bomb to defend themselves.

..................................................

While President Reagan saw SDI as a way to enable us to safely ban nuclear weapons, Obama wants to ban both nuclear weapons AND the SDI program.

Obama keeps falsely calling SDI "unproven". And he's bought into the Russian's terms: a shield is a "weapon", "aimed" at Russia. Is a bulllet-proof vest a weapon? Obama thinks weapons in the hands of rogue nations make us unsafe--but he thinks America IS a rogue nation.

Even when Reagan announced SDI, critics said he was "weaponizing space". Obama seems to have adopted this attitude. In fact, Reagan was DE-weaponizing space. Reagan was not able to reach zero--but by defeating the Soviets, he made drastic reductions possible.

Total disarmament would have been extremely hard even in Reagan's era. Would China have cooperated? Or Israel? Unlikely. And the proliferation since then makes it even harder.

Russia seems more wedded to its remaining nukes than ever--and is helping Iran. That's what makes the Russian position so outrageous. They know Poland is not going to invade Russia. They simply want to be able to bully Europe, and at the same time, they are enabling Iran to bomb Europe. If Iran is not stopped, we'll be lucky to avoid an arms race in the Gulf. Ditto for Japan with the Norks. If these countries don't trust America to keep the peace, they might try to weaponize or simply cave in and appease their rogue neighbors. Not to mention the question of Israel's security.

When Obama says that America is just as bad or worse than anybody else, that can hardly be reassuring. And while most government programs are getting a 1000 % real increase, Obama is proposing cuts--real cuts--in defense spending. SDI is being cut 15% while 6 Billion is headed to pay ObamaCorps "volunteers". Nevermind that by definition, if they're being paid, they're not volunteers.

Didn't Democrats say "our army is broken" and "stretched to the breaking point"? And now they're slashing it? If he was going to bow, he should bow before his betters in the services, not a Saudi fraud. He owes our troops an apology, not France.

The image of Reagan as an anti-nuke protestor is delicious, though. Ironically, if he had gone ahead with his protest, Truman might have labeled him a left-wing nut and ended his career. Instead, he went on to win Truman's Cold War. He would have gladly been out marching with those Nuclear Freeze protestors had it not been a phony Soviet Front, designed to impose a Freeze only upon America.

Don't be fooled: Reagan and Obama both wanted an end to nukes. But Ronald Reagan believed in "Peace Through Strength", while Obama believes in "Strength through Peace".

GET WELL SOON

Our old friend P.J. O'Rourke is dealing with health issues and P.J., we want you to know that you are in our thoughts. We're praying for your ass, so to speak.

Few have done more to advance conservative ideas in the last few decades than P.J. O'Rourke, and no one has done it with more humor. You won't always agree with him, but frankly, he doesn't care.

As a tribute, I've selflessly stolen some of his best quotes and posted them here without sending him a dime. I'm just thoughtful that way. But if it makes you feel better, you can buy his books here--highly recommended. We hope he feels better, too--and soon.

You're never going to read 'The Wealth of Nations', and you shouldn't really. It's 900 pages.

Our government gets more than thugs in a protection racket demand, more even than discarded first wives of famous rich men receive in divorce court. Then this government, swollen and arrogant with pelf, goes butting into our business. It checks the amount of tropical oils in our snack foods, tells us what kind of gasoline we can buy for our cars and how fast we can drive them, bosses us around about retirement, education and what's on TV; counts our noses and asks fresh questions about who's still living at home and how many bathrooms we have; decides whether the door to our office or shop should have steps or a wheelchair ramp; decrees the gender and complexion of the people to be hired there; lectures us on safe sex; dictates what we can sniff, smoke, and swallow; and waylays young men, ships them to distant places and tells them to shoot people they don't even know.

Many reporters, when they go to work in the nation’s capital, begin thinking of themselves as participants in the political process instead of glorified stenographers.

Wherever there's injustice, oppression, and suffering, America will show up six months late and bomb the country next to where it's happening.

Whatever it is that the government does, sensible Americans would prefer that the government does it to somebody else. This is the idea behind foreign policy.

"Liberal" is, of course, one of those fine English words, like lady, gay and welfare, which has been spoiled by special pleading. When I say liberals I certainly don't mean openhanded individuals or tolerant persons or even Big Government Democrats. I mean people who are excited that one percent of the profits of Ben & Jerry's ice cream goes to promote world peace. Any rich man does more for society than all the jerks pasting 'Visualize World Peace' bumper stickers on their cars. The worst leech of a merger and acquisitions lawyer making $500,000 a year will, even if he cheats on his taxes, put $100,000 into the public coffers. That's $100,000 worth of education, charity or US Marines. And the Marine Corps does more to promote world peace than all the Ben & Jerry's ice-cream ever made.

Earnestness is stupidity sent to college.

What I discovered in Somalia is a place where there was no shortage of food ... There was a shortage of public order. There was a shortage of a social system to provide food for people who were powerless. Rice was selling in Mogadishu at 10 cents a kilo -- the cheapest rice in the world because of all the rice that had been donated. The problem was that if you didn't have a gun in Mogadishu you didn't have 10 cents. It didn't matter how cheap or readily available the rice was. There were people with guns taking it away from the people who didn't have guns.

I like to think of my behavior in the sixties as a "learning experience." Then again, I like to think of anything stupid I've done as a "learning experience." It makes me feel less stupid.

If Europeans didn't discover North America then how'd we all get here?

I really didn't understand before that moment, I didn't realize until just then - we won. The Free World won the Cold War. All the people who had been sent to gulags, who'd been crushed in the streets of Budapest, Prague and Warsaw, the soldiers who'd died in Korea and my friends and classmates who had been killed in Vietnam - it meant something now. All the treasure that we in America had poured into guns, planes, Star Wars and all the terrifying A-bombs we'd had to build and keep - it wasn't for nothing. And the best thing about our victory is the way we did it - not just with ICBMs and Green Berets and aid to the Contras. Those things were important, but in the end we beat them with Levi 501 jeans. Seventy-two years of Communist indoctrination and propaganda was drowned out by a three-ounce Sony Walkman. A huge totalitarian system with all its tanks and guns, gulag camps, and secret police has been brought to its knees because nobody wants to wear Bulgarian shoes. They may have had the soldiers and the warheads and the fine-sounding ideology that suckered the college students and nitwit Third Worlders, but we had all the fun. Now they're lunch, and we're number one on the planet.

If you are young and you drink a great deal it will spoil your health, slow your mind, make you fat - in other words, turn you into an adult.

The mystery of government is not how Washington works but how to make it stop.

The first nine Commandments concern theological principles and social law. But then, right at the end, is 'Don't envy your buddy's cow.' How did that make the top ten? What's it doing there? Why would God, with just ten things to tell Moses, choose as one of those things jealousy about the starter mansion with in-ground pool next door? Yet think how important the Tenth Commandment is to a community, to a nation, indeed to a presidential election. If you want a mule, if you want a pot roast, if you want a cleaning lady, don't be a jerk and whine about what the people across the street have — go get your own. The Tenth Commandment sends a message to all the jerks who want redistribution of wealth, higher taxes, more government programs, more government regulation, more government, less free enterprise, and less freedom. And the message is clear and concise: Go to hell.

Some people say a front-engine car handles best. Some people say a rear-engine car handles best. I say a rented car handles best.

Neither conservatives nor humorists believe man is good. But left-wingers do.

Italy is not technically part of the Third World, but no one has told the Italians.

The principle feature of American liberalism is sanctimoniousness. By loudly denouncing all bad things - war and hunger and date rape - liberals testify to their own terrific goodness. More important, they promote themselves to membership in a self-selecting elite of those who care deeply about such things... It's a kind of natural aristocracy, and the wonderful thing about this aristocracy is that you don't have to be brave, smart, strong or even lucky to join it, you just have to be liberal.

Liberals are the ditch carp of democracy.

What is this oozing behemoth, this fibrous tumor, this monster of power and expense hatched from the simple human desire for civic order? How did an allegedly free people spawn a vast, rampant cuttlefish of dominion with its tentacles in every orifice of the body politic?

My Grandmother wouldn't even speak the word Democrat if there were children in the room. She'd say "Bastards" instead.

Wealth is, for most people, the only honest and likely path to liberty. With money comes power over the world. Men are freed from drudgery, women from exploitation. Businesses can be started, homes built, communities formed, religions practiced, educations pursued. But liberals aren't very interested in such real and material freedoms. They have a more innocent -- not to say toddlerlike -- idea of freedom. Liberals want the freedom to put anything into their mouths, to say bad words and to expose their private parts in art museums.

In an egalitarian world everything will be controlled by politics, and politics requires no merit.

The great religions...teach salvation as an individual matter. There are no group discounts in the Ten Commandments, Christ was not a committee, and Allah does not welcome believers into Paradise saying, "You weren't much good yourself, but you were standing near some good people." That we are individuals-unique, disparate and willful - is something we understand instinctively from an early age. No child ever wrote to Santa: 'Bring me -- and a bunch of kids I've never met -- a pony, and we'll share.'

Even bad music has gotten better because it's gotten shorter. One of Wagner's pieces took four days to play. Now the latest single from Hootie and the Blowfish clocks in at just over three minutes.

Terrible danger lurks in the idea that the government should do more to protect people and give them more of the things they need. France shows you what happens when you base politics on the idea that the government has to give ever-greater protection and benefits to people: the economy simply gets asphyxiated. France's official unemployment rate is 10 per cent; its real rate is probably closer to 40 per cent. Government regulations ensure that business-people can't fire anyone in France. They respond by not hiring anyone.

Q:"Why are conservatives opposed to gun control?"
A:"In case we have to shoot Democrats. It happened during the Civil War, and it could happen again."

Just as some things are too strange for fiction, others are too true for journalism.

The whole idea of government is this: if enough people get together and act in concert, they can take something and not pay for it.

'Government conspiracy'? They can't even deliver our mail and it's got our address on it and everything!

That liberals aren't enamored of real freedom may have something to do with responsibility - that cumbersome backpack which all free men have to lug on life's aerobic nature hike. The second item in the liberal creed, after self-righteousness, is unaccountability. Liberals have invented whole college majors - psychology, sociology, women's studies - to prove that nothing is anybody's fault. No one is fond of taking responsibility for his actions, but consider how much you'd have to hate free will to come up with a political platform that advocates killing unborn babies but not convicted murderers. A callous pragmatist might favor abortion AND capital punishment. A devout Christian would sanction neither. But it takes years of therapy to arrive at the liberal point of view.

I have often been called a Nazi, and although it is unfair, I don't let it bother me. I don't let it bother me for one simple reason. No one has *ever* had a sexual fantasy about being tied to a bed and sexually ravished by someone dressed as a liberal.

It was Marxism nonetheless because the wildest hippie and the sternest member of the Politburo shared the same daydream, the daydream that underlies all Marxism : That a thing might somehow be worth other than what people will give for it.

Note that the drug testing hubbub began with testing professional athletes. True, children look up to pro athletes. But children are short and look up to everything.

Like many men of my generation, I had an opportunity to give war a chance, and I promptly chickened out. I went to my draft physical in 1970 with a doctor's letter about my history of drug abuse. The letter was four and a half pages long with three and a half pages devoted to listing the drugs I'd abused. I was shunted into the office of an Army psychiatrist who, at the end of a forty-five minute interview with me, was pounding his desk and shouting, "You're fucked up! You don't belong in the Army!" He was certainly right on the first count and possibly right on the second. Anyway, I didn't have to go. But that, of course, meant someone else had to go in my place. I would like to dedicate this book to him. I hope you got back in one piece, fellow. I hope you were more use to your platoon mates than I would have been. I hope you're rich and happy now. And in 1971, when somebody punched me in the face for being a long-haired peace creep, I hope it was you.

I loved this car (Jaguar XJ12). I loved the other cars. I love all cars, if the truth be known. We're told cars are dangerous. It's safer to drive through South Central LA than to walk there. We're told cars are wasteful. Wasteful of what? Oil did a lot of good sitting in the ground for millions of years. ...and we're told cars cause pollution. A 100 years ago city streets were ankle deep in horse excrement. What kind of pollution do you want? Would you rather die of cancer at eighty or typhoid fever at nine? Cars have made us richer, freer, happer people. Life is better because of cars. Cars are good.

Family love is messy, clinging, and of an annoying and repetitive pattern, like bad wallpaper.

Remember, FDA employees are serious about fear. We pay these people to panic about an iota of rodent hair in our chili, even when the recipe calls for it. FDA employees are first-class agonizers, world champions at losing sleep. When Meryl Streep got hysterical about Alar, they actually checked the apples instead of Meryl's head.

Government subsidies can be critically analyzed according to a simple principle: You are smarter than the government, so when the government pays you to do something you wouldn't do on your own, it is almost always paying you to do something stupid.

Schneider has made a career of telling the public that the climate is going to change drastically any time now, and indeed every spring and fall he's been right.

When government does, occasionally, work, it works in an elitist fashion. That is, government is most easily manipulated by people who have money and power already. This is why government benefits usually go to people who don't need benefits from government. Government may make some environmental improvements, but these will be improvements for rich bird-watchers. And no one in government will remember that when poor people go bird-watching they do it at Kentucky Fried Chicken.

If we're going to improve the environment, the first thing we should do is duck the government. The second thing we should do is quit being moral. Screw the rights of nature. Nature will have rights as soon as it get duties. The minute we see birds, trees, bugs, and squirrels picking up litter, giving money to charity, and keeping an eye on our kids at the park, we'll let them vote.

A pleasant natural environment is a good - a luxury good, philosophical good, a moral goody-good, a good time for all. Whatever, we want it. If we want something, we should pay for it, with our labor or our cash. We shouldn't beg it, steal it, sit around wishing for it, or euchre the government into taking it by force.

It's better to spend money like there's no tomorrow then to spend tonight like there's no money.

It's easier and more fun to take a tragic view of life. It's a better method of self-dramatizing. Everybody would rather star in Hamlet than in 'Three's Company'. If you want to understand the psychology of politics, just look at teen-agers. I mean, teen-agers are expert at self-dramatization. And so of course they're picking problems. You can't self-dramatize a joy or a joke or a good mood. Nothing cures anomie, whatever that may be - we have no idea what that word means: we might as well say we suffer from "brigadoon". We don't know what it means, and neither do the French - nothing cures that sort of unfocused upsetness like duty, responsibility, hard work. If you've got places you've got to be, things you've got to do, and people you've got to take care of, you don't have time for that sort of adolescent mewling. You find very few Kurt Cobain fans among the starving people of the world.

Overpopulation: Just Enough of Me, Way Too Much of You

These issues are excellent springboards for collectivism. You can use these issues as an excuse to expand the powers of government or international organizations or bureaucracy. And who runs the state? It turns out to be the same people who are so worried about overpopulation, famine, poverty, injustice and so on: the Al Gores, the Bill Clintons. And isn't this a marvellous excuse, because who can possibly say 'No, no, no, I'm in favour of famine?'

If the government, or some international bureaucracy or some sort of authority should be consulted about whether you have kids, then where shouldn't authority be consulted? My contention is that liberals hate people. People are not an asset in the liberal world view.

Now notice that they don't try it on us. It's always on people who look different than us. Worry about overpopulation is an acceptable liberal form of racism. It always has to do with yellow, black or brown people. They're never worried about the slew of Swedes, who are all over the place, or the mass of French people who wind up on the Riviera every August.

In fact, the whole Riviera is packed in August, and neither Malthus nor Ehrlich have complained about the topless beaches of St. Tropez.

Bringing the government in to run Wall Street is like saying, “Dad burned dinner, let’s get the dog to cook.” Now the government’s going to take over the auto industry. I can predict the result: a light-weight, compact, sustainable vehicle using alternative energy. When I was a kid we called it a 'Schwinn'.”