cosmoscon

Unless you’ve been living under a rock the last few weeks, you know about the death of a 17 year old boy named Trayvon Martin in Florida where a neighborhood watchman named George Zimmerman got into an altercation with Mr. Martin, shot him and killed him.  The details are still coming to light and you can see the details here and there will be more developments over the coming days.

Let me state for the record that if Mr. Zimmerman is charged with murder in a court of law then I’ll be the first to volunteer to throw the switch on the electric chair or lock him up in a cell for life.  If you seek out and kill a kid based on his race then you are scum and deserve to be removed from society.  

But we don’t execute people orput a bounty on their head based on rumor or emotional charged anger.  In the United States we have a means of punishing our criminals and people are still innocent until proven guilty.  If we lose that premise then we have lost our country and we are no better than a tyrannical dictatorship.

There is a hashtag on twitter called #TeamDueProcess that has captured many of the death threats on Mr. Zimmerman and I’ll show a few of these below.

And of course our President has taken the low road and sown seeds of racial division with his recent comments.

“If I had a son, he’d look like Trayvon,” Obama said, underscoring how the issue affected him on a personal, and not just a political or legal, level. “I think [Trayvon’s parents] are right to expect that all of us as Americans are going to take this with the seriousness it deserves, and we are going to get to the bottom of exactly what happened.”

“Obviously, this is a tragedy,” he said. “I can only imagine what these parents are going through, and when I think about this boy, I think about my own kids, and I think every parent in America should be able to understand why it is absolutely imperative that we investigate every aspect of this, and that everybody pulls together — federal, state and local — to figure out exactly how this tragedy happened.”

“I think all of us have to do some soul searching to figure out how does something like this happen,” said Obama. “And that means we examine the laws and the context for what happened, as well as the specifics of the incident.”

I agree with Obama that we should investigate this tragic death and find out the truth but to take the knee jerk reaction that this is a case of race based violence doesn’t help the country deal with this tragedy.  Let’s understand the facts before we rush to judgment.   Like I said, I’ll be the first to grab a pitchfork and torch to persecute this witch but before I join the mob I want to make 100% sure I’m actually going after a witch.

The Florida police need to gather the details and bring Mr. Zimmerman to trial and let our legal system determine his guilt or innocence.  Our legal system is not perfect but I dare you to find a better one and let’s hold off the talk of lynching until we get the facts.  If we abandon this legal system then be aware that the mob might be coming for you tomorrow.  Is that what we want?

I engaged in a thought experiment regarding the possible outcomes of the 2012 elections and I have determined that conservatives (and America as a whole) will benefit from 75% of the possible scenarios.   

While going through this thought experiment I considered all the permutations with regard to the House of Representatives, Senate and White House and gave each two possible outcomes – Republican or Democratic control.  For the sake of this post I’m going to assume that the House of Representatives will stay firmly in control of Republicans and I don’t think that is debatable except for those who choose to live in an alternate reality like Debbie Wasserman-Schultz.  That leaves four possible outcomes of the 2012 elections and I’ll go over each below.

Republicans take control of the White House and Senate

So let’s assume that Romney (who is probably the Republican nominee) can sway enough independents and moderates so that he beats Obama and Republicans are able to pick up enough Senate seats to replace Harry Reid with Mitch McConnell. 

In this scenario Romney would be able to replace the heads of HHS, EPA, DoJ, FDA and other agencies that are killing America with over regulation and the Senate could then drive Romney to the Right by sending him legislation (Cut, Cap and Balance, Repeal Obamacare and a budget similar to Paul Ryan’s) that will return America to a more fiscally conservative position.  Romney would receive an incredible amount of backlash from the Right if he refused to sign this legislation and even if you ascribe to the harshest characterization of Romney (he is a shape shifter who changes to fit the majority) then you’ll agree that he’ll morph into a conservative to satisfy the Republican majority in the Legislative branch of government.

 There is another long term benefit of this scenario.  As the economy improves through fiscal and economic conservative principles, Americans who have been brain washed by the Main Stream Media and other Leftists will once again see the value of conservative principles with regard to the economy and budget/spending and will start to vote for more conservatives in future elections.  Most Americans are not political pundits and vote with their bank accounts and as the economy is humming and they see the difference between the Obama years and the Romney years, conservatives will gain new converts.

Republicans take control of the White House and Democrats retain control of Senate

In this scenario Harry Reid would never bring legislation up for a vote that conservatives in the House propose (which has been the case for the past 2 years) but there is still hope.  Even if SCOTUS doesn’t deem Obamacare unconstitutional, Romney could still stifle and delay the implementation of this albatross by putting the brakes on the regulation writing in the HHS.

Regulations can be rolled back with new appointments to the various agencies and political pressure could be placed on Reid with both the House and the Executive branch against him. It wouldn’t be ideal but the bleeding could be stopped and Republicans could also spin the “Do Nothing Senate” narrative that could lead to a Senate flip in the mid-term elections.  

Obama is re-elected and Republicans take control of the Senate

With Obama in the White House for four more years and if SCOTUS doesn’t deem the individual mandate of Obamacare unconstitutional then the repeal of it is basically impossible.  But this scenario could also be beneficial to Republicans if they choose to play hard ball.

Imagine if the Republican Congress repeatedly sent bills to the desk of the President only to have them gather cobwebs.  Congress could shut down the government and force Obama’s hand and then talk about the “Do Nothing President” and talk how he is resisting the will of America (who elected Republican majorities in both the House and Senate).  The ire of the American people would then be redirected from Congress to the President and possibly force his hand.

But there is another subtle aspect of this scenario that could lead to long term gains for conservatives.  A Romney defeat in the wake of 3+ years of the most Liberal President in history could spell the end of the “Washington establishment” that produced such a poor field of Republican candidates.  People will start to wake up to the fact that we need to have fiscally and economically proven conservatives in the primary and Republicans should not only rally around them but defend them when the MSM and other Leftists seek to smear them.

I subscribe to the theory that, because of the Leftist brain washing of Americans, it is difficult to elect a strong conservative to the Executive office and that is one of the reasons I have supported Romney in this election.  But if Romney loses, then I’ll concede that this theory is wrong and will fight harder than ever to make sure I don’t make this same mistake in 2016.

Obama is re-elected and Democrats retain control of the Senate

This is the only scenario that I can’t see turning out well for not only conservatives but for America.  This perfect storm would not only mean a reprise of the last 3+ years but could also signal more socialistic tendencies of Obama since he won’t have to worry about campaigning for re-election. 

The worst case scenario is that America is fast tracked on a course that several countries in Europe are on with sky rocketing debt, mushrooming entitlement programs that can’t be funded and riots in the streets.  Americans live in a country where over 90% of tax revenues go to fund Social Security, Welfare, Unemployment Insurance, Medicare and Medicaid and we have to borrow the rest to take care of what the government was originally intended to do (building infrastructure, provide for common defense, etc.).  Why is a majority of Americans not outraged by this?  It’s because the Leftist brainwashing has worked and we now have generations of Americans who are comfortable with European style socialism even though those countries are breaking under the weight of their debt.

This scenario could also rejuvenate the conservative base to demand more from the Republican Party to field more conservative candidates but I fear that 4 more years of Harry Reid and Barack Obama steering our country will be hard to overcome.  We see with Greece that even though the country is failing because of their unsustainable entitlement programs, the Greeks resist austerity and riot in the streets (giving up those handouts is hard to do).  This same scene will be coming to an American city near you if this dreadful election scenario plays out.

Americans must fight for any of the first three scenarios if we have any hopes of turning this country around.  If you are a conservative and so unsatisfied with Mitt Romney that you’ll sit the election out then that is your right but you need to fight like hell to make sure Republicans win back the Senate. 

UPDATE 22-MAR-12 – Updated chart labels and added graphs using OMB data at the end

There was a recent post at Economists View that noted how Clinton and Obama were very austere Presidents in recent history with regard to Federal spending.  The conclusions and graph (showing increased spending per capita) are shown below:

“To compare presidencies, I did the calculation two ways. One starts in the quarter before the president was elected (e.g., 2008Q4), the other starts in the first quarter of the presidency (e.g., 2009Q1). (The ARRA probably had some effect in Q1, but most of the change was simply economic conditions that the incoming president had nothing to do with, so I think I prefer the Q1 to Q1 method). Ranking since Johnson (starting in 1968), and using the first-quarter comparisons, and calculating growth under Obama through 2011Q4, Clinton is the most austere, followed by Obama. The most spendthrift are (1) Nixon-Ford, (2) Reagan, and (3) Bush II.”

From the post, it is not clear how the author calculated the percent growth but I’m assuming that he took the average of each year’s spending growth (versus the previous year) under their term as President.  I believe the author also uses the calendar year (Jan-Dec) to calculate the FY for each president and this differs from the official US government fiscal year of October of the previous year to September of the year numbered.    

I wanted to verify this myself and I used the following site to obtain my data and it should be noted that this data utilizes the actual US government FY (October to September) so this will not be an apples to apples comparison but should be close.  This site included all Federal Government spending per capita and normalized it to 2005 dollars so this provides a fair comparison year to year for each President.

Here is a graph showing the total Federal government spending increase (or decrease) when compared to the previous year.

Here is a graph showing the average of each year’s spending growth during the term of each President starting with Nixon/Ford.

I then performed a calculation to show the average total spending for each year during each President’s term and compared that to the previous president’s average (Nixon/Ford was compared to Johnson).

Here is a graph showing average spending per capita (in constant 2005 dollars) during each President’s tenure.

It should be noted that using the US government FY, TARP is included in the 2009 budget and was passed under Bush II but Obama voted for this legislation so it is fair to attribute this spending to him.  The ARRA (2009 Stimulus which amounted to $787 billion) was also a big component of the 2009 massive increase in spending and this is definitely associated with Obama.

I will agree with the post on Economists View that Clinton (with the aid of a Republican House/Senate) was the most austere but I disagree with Obama being a penny pincher.   Instead, the Community-Organizer-in-Chief is more akin to a drunken sailor on leave (no offense to our fine men and women who serve in our Navy).

Full Disclosure – My raw data is available here–> us fed spending per president

ADDENDUM (22-MAR-12) – I saw some blowback on my twitter feed that the data at usgovernmentspending.com is suspect in how they calculate inflation.  I have to data to either confirm or deny this but have been using this site for a while and find it very good but in fairness I don’t want to ignore other data so I decided to use the website for the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).

There was not much difference and in many ways the graphs are almost identical.  They are provided below:

Full Disclosure – My raw data for the OMB calculations is available here. Copy of hist01z3

As if the 17 minutes long propaganda video wasn’t enough, now Vice President Joe Biden takes his turn at trying to make Americans forget about the colossal failure of the Obama administration.  

In a Politico article we learn how Biden sees Obama’s approval of the Navy Seal’s plan to take out Osama Bin Laden:

“You can go back 500 years. You cannot find a more audacious plan. Never knowing for certain. We never had more than a 48 percent probability that he was there,” Biden said at a fundraiser in Morris Township, N.J.”

Let’s look at the definition of “audacious”:

au·da·cious

adjective

1. extremely bold or daring; recklessly brave; fearless: an audacious explorer.

2. extremely original; without restriction to prior ideas; highly inventive: an audacious vision of the city’s bright future.

3. recklessly bold in defiance of convention, propriety, law, or the like; insolent; brazen.

4. lively; unrestrained; uninhibited: an audacious interpretation of her role.

I will be the first to congratulate the Navy Seals and our Intelligence community for devising a plan to take this cockroach out so I’ll salute President Obama for authorizing this military action.  But to call this the most audacious plan in military history in the past 500 years is more than a little over the top and can be characterized solely as shilling for Obama.

What about the coordinated attack on Normandy where the US, England and Canada simultaneously attacked 5 beaches (Gold, Utah, Omaha, Juno and Sword)?  I have to think there was a risk there of failure and the planning that went into that assault dwarfs the raid on a house in Pakistan. 

What about the battle of Gettysburg, Guadalcanal, the battle on Inchon, Iowa Jima, El Alamein, Midway, Coral Sea, the Alamo, Bunker Hill and the battle of Trenton?  I’d say all of these and many more were more audacious than the execution of Osama Bin Laden.

Let’s face it, the Liberals are restless.  Obama’s approval ratings are still below 50%, the economic recovery is anemic , Americans are fed up with our spending that has recently caused our nation debt to equal our GDP and pragmatic people are worried about the sword of Damocles hanging over our heads called Obamacare.

The Leftists are desperate and are trying everything they can to sway public opinion but I have faith in the American public to see through these lies and propaganda and reach their own conclusions.  To quote Biden, the elections of 2012 are a big F@%king deal.  

Photo from Akhtar Soomro/Reuters

With the latest civilian killings in Afghanistan, I can safely say it is time to pull all US personnel out of this country sooner rather than later.

Details are still rolling in but here is what we do know from the Wall-Street Journal:

“KABUL—A U.S. soldier walked off his base in Afghanistan and opened fire on local villagers Sunday, Afghan and U.S. officials said, killing 16 people in a shooting spree that further complicates American efforts to end its longest foreign war.”

“The soldier, who allegedly gunned down his victims—most of them women and children—about a mile from the U.S. base in the Panjway district of Kandahar province, surrendered and is now in U.S. custody. His identity hasn’t been disclosed.”

OK, this is just awful.  I don’t want to speculate on motives here and I’ll wait for details to be released by the Military but the killing of innocent women and children in cold blood goes beyond any sense of decency in a civilized society.  I have never served in the Military so I can’t speak of the horrors of war but I can’t see any American (Military or Civilian) making excuses for these murders.

 It’s not like the recent relationship with Afghans and the US Military has been described as cordial.  Just a few weeks ago 5 US soldiers burned Korans and this sparked off new levels of protests, violence and fraying of relations between the two parties.  Of course my thoughts and prayers go out to the innocent families who suffered loss but I also offer even more prayers to the US Military in Afghanistan.  Their mission just transitioned from “difficult” to “impossible” and I can only imagine what is going through the minds of each man and women in uniform over there.   

I was quick to join many in criticizing Obama’s rush to apologize for the Koran burnings and my reasons were similar to those expressed in this post from Crockett Lives – Instead of apologizing for America, Obama should apologize to America.  The burning of the Korans could be justified based on the fact that prisoners were using them to pass secret messages back and forth and putting our troops and the mission in danger.  If the Apologizer-in-Chief ever needed to apologize, now is the time but unfortunately, Obama’s apology will fall on deaf ears because the President seems to make these apologies monthly to our enemies and now he is starting to lose what little credibility he had in the international community.

If we leave now the last thing Afghans will remember are the Koran burnings and the killing of innocent women and children and I believe this will embolden the Taliban in that country and create another Osama Bin Laden.  But radical Islam hates America not because of these two isolated events but because of who we are – a free nation that doesn’t follow the teachings of Islam.  That fact alone was the source of all terrorism against us so there is nothing we can do in Afghanistan now that will alter a terrorist’s world view of America.

Here is another quote from the Wall-Street Journal article that characterizes the Taliban’s mood in Afghanistan:

“The Taliban lost no time in condemning the Panjway killings, describing them Sunday as “genocide” that resulted from a U.S. night raid.  ”The so-called American peacekeepers have once again quenched their thirst with the blood of innocent Afghan civilians,” the Taliban said. The insurgents pledged to “avenge every single death inflicted by the savage murderer invaders.”

Our mission in Afghanistan is over.  We killed Bin Laden, weakened the Taliban and helped train the local police/government to run their country.  In light of the events over the past month, it is now abundantly clear that our next step should be 1) offer restitution to the families affected by these murders, 2) bring those who carried out these murders to justice and 3) evacuate all US personnel from Afghanistan as quickly as possible (not leaving anyone behind to become the target of revenge attacks).  Bring them all home now! 

According to Liberals in the Main Stream Media (MSM), like Soledad O’Brien, the latest Breitbart video that was shown on the Sean Hannity Show last night is a big nothing burger – nothing to see here, so move along.  Sorry to burst your bubble Ms. O’Brien but you don’t get to make these kinds of decisions anymore.  Conservatives are going to vet Obama and all candidates for office in 2012 and you don’t get to make the decisions about what is news worthy.

You can tell she is scared of what this video will eventually show regarding Obama’s radical past because she tries to mock the video and a Breitbart representative.  Don’t believe me?  Follow this link to see the CNN anchor (and most of her panel) act like middle school kids as they try to diminish the news worthiness of the video.  Pay attention as Ms. O’Brien’s panel tries to mock Breitbart.com Editor-In-chief Joel Pollak and then switches the subject to the MSM’s favorite straw man argument – calling Conservatives racists.  Pitiful!

Is the Video a Big Deal?

The video by itself isn’t the whole story so you have to look at the entire body of work.  The irrefutable facts of the video are simple – We have Obama introducing Dr. Derrick Bell, telling the audience to “open up your hearts and your minds to the words of Professor Derrick Bell” and then embracing him in a hug.  But now we need to find out what kind of person Dr. Bell is because imagine if a video surfaced showing Mitt Romney saying those same words about an openly racist figure (say David Duke) and then hugging him.  Call me crazy but I think CNN would be making a big deal out of that video. 

Who is Dr. Derrick Bell?  Breitbart.com has many stories on their site showing how Professor Derrick Bell was a radical racist and there is a great review from the Boston College Law Review showing the racists views the Critical Race Theory seeks to spread.  Here is Thomas Sowell on the Dennis Miller show giving us his assessment of Derrick Bell.  I’m sure more of these stories will be slowly released by various conservative news sites and we’ll get the full picture of how our sitting President embraced radical racial views and class warfare while in college.  Which won’t surprise conservatives but this type of information might be news to independent and politically middle of the road people.

But the video isn’t a knockout punch and I don’t think it was meant to serve that purpose.  In my opinion this video was meant as a shot across the bow or like an opening salvo in a war to save American Liberties.

#VetThePrez and #War

These are the hashtags on Twitter that have become synonymous with the election battle of 2012.  Conservatives are no longer staying on the defensive but are going on the offensive with regard to the MSM.  It’s been a long time coming and it’s not like we haven’t paid our dues on the defensive side of the football with Gardasil, Rick Perry’s painted rock, Bain Capital, Newt’s Ex-Wives and other assorted darlings of the MSM.  It’s time to pick up the ball and run with it.  The more Conservatives are on offense means the less time the MSM has to dig up trivial points and construct straw man arguments. 

Are you ready?  Do you wonder if this is a worthwhile tactic?  Are you skeptical if it will have any impact?  I’ll just show you a couple examples over the last 24 hours and you can be the judge.

Last night there were more fireworks as Fox News contributor Juan Williams got the message from Michelle Malkin that Leftists don’t get to tell us what subjects are news worthy and which are not.  Watch Mr. Williams’ reaction when Ms. Malkin lit into him at the end.

Watch two Leftist Congresswomen get nervous and refuse to answer questions about why they are inconsistent with their righteous indignation toward those who spew caustic insults at women – They were quick with the vitriol against Rush Limbaugh but strangely silent when Leftists like Bill Maher make equally detestable remarks about women.  These Leftists were being confronted opening in public and asked to explain their obvious double standards and they did not like it!

This is how Conservatives will fight and win the election battle in 2012.  Does this mean we stop reminding people about Obama’s complete failure as a leader over the past 3 years?  Of course it doesn’t.  We still must hammer Leftists on unemployment, over regulation, gas prices, Obamacare, Fast and Furious, Solyndra and the union thug activity of the NLRB.

It’s going to be fun to watch the confused MSM learn they are no longer holding the ball and must instead try to prevent us from crossing the goal line. 

With the dust settling on the Republican Primary after Super Tuesday, it is becoming clearer that Mitt Romney will be the Republican nominee and those who want to defeat Barack Obama should start lining up in support of him.

The 2012 elections have immense implications for our country as we hope to turn back the tide of over regulation, Obamacare, massive debt and return the United States back to its founding principles of individual freedom and the Free Market.  We can only do this if Republicans/Conservatives: 1) maintain our majority in the House, 2) gain control of the Senate and 3) win the White house.  In this post I’ll focus on what we need to do to win the Executive office and why that means throwing our support behind Mitt Romney.  

Conservatives, like me, would have loved to see a strong conservative like a Paul Ryan, Marco Rubio or Rand Paul win the Republican presidential nomination but that didn’t happen so we are left with the wisdom of William F. Buckley in determining our candidate that will face Obama in November – We must pick the most conservative candidate who can win.

Remember What We Are Up Against In 2012 

For decades, Liberal policies have poisoned peoples’ thinking and it will take years to reverse it so let’s face it, the brainwashed people won’t be swayed in the coming months to reverse the Liberal propaganda to endorse a strong conservative candidate who speaks of fiscally conservative policies (cutting entitlements such as Welfare, Medicare, Medicaid, Unemployment and Social Security) while simulateously speaking of social issues such as gay marriage, birth control and calling women sluts.  Over the next 4 years we must demonstrate to America citizens that true fiscally conservative policies are better than liberal Keynesian policies before Americans will vote for true conservative candidates in future elections.

Most of the citizens in America are not political junkies who are in tune with the vagaries of current events and my wife is a prime example.  She is a very intelligent person (a degreed Civil Engineer) but she made a comment to me today that I think speaks to the millions of Americans who reside in the “middle” of the political spectrum.  She stated that Obama will win in November because 1) Unemployment is coming down and 2) Republicans are beating themselves up and looking stupid.  While I tried to counsel her on the real unemployment rate and the failures of the 2009 Stimulus, there is a lot of wisdom in her comments and they come from someone that will pull the Republican lever in November.

The Leftists will always pull the lever for the Democrats so we shouldn’t waste our time on them but those in the middle-left, middle and middle-right are the targets for 2012.  These people get their news from mostly Main Stream Media (MSM) and will form their opinions based on what they here on NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN and MSNBC.  You will not hear fiscally conservative policies described in detail on these 30 minute newscasts so we have to come to grips that the voting public will need to connect with our Republican nominee if we have any hopes of them voting for him and winning the White House in 2012. 

I outlined a typical Facebook conversation I had with center-left friends in this post.   Read it and see if you think Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul or Rich Santorum has a chance of getting this demographic vote in November.

The Case for Romney

I stated my reasons for voting for Mitt Romney in the South Carolina primary several months ago.  Romney has promised to roll back regulation (which includes repealing Obamacare), reign in union thugs, promote an energy policy that makes sense and exercise fiscal conservative responsibility (balancing the federal budget, capping government spending as a percentage of GDP and reforming entitlements). 

Recently, the Obama and Romney tax plans have been compared and you can see from this post that Obama plans to soak the rich (successful) while Romney plans to reduce tax rates for all those who are working and paying taxes (including the middle class).  This should resonate with those in the political middle who work and pay income taxes if we can get this message heard above the propaganda of the MSM.

Obama is scared of Romney and he tipped his hand last fall.  All throughout this primary fight, Obama’s team (led by the blame storming Debbie Wasserman-Schultz) have focused their attacks solely on Romney.  They know he is the biggest threat to their re-election and this is why they spend all of their energy on attacking only Romney.

With a Republican House and Senate to send bills to Romney’s desk, I have no doubt that he’ll sign them and we’ll get America back to its fiscally conservative principles and the Free Market will do what it does best – facilitate growth in the GDP and lower real unemployment.  It’s time to move from vetting our candidate to campaigning against Obama. Let’s go, it’s a war so arm yourselves.

Georgetown University’s position on the issue of birth control is not a well guarded secret and after spending 5 minutes on Google, I found this article which made the very clear point that Georgetown University does not delve into areas of pre-marital sex or birth control.   So I have to ask – If free birth control is so important to Sandra Fluke, why did she not read this before applying to Georgetown Law School?  A few quotes below from the Georgetown Independent link (emphasis mine):

“Georgetown, as a Catholic institution, sits in a difficult position of needing both to protect the health of its students and to stay true to its Catholic identity. Many theories about the sexual activity of students abound, both on the Georgetown campus and on college campuses nation-wide. But two facts remains (sic) undeniably true — some students will have sex and some will get sexually transmitted infections.”

“Although Georgetown officially prohibits itself from taking action in response to sexual issues, University administrators are allowed to talk about these topics. Health Education workers are allowed to advise students on sexual matters. In addition, the Student Primary Care Clinic tests for and treats both STIs and pregnancy, although it is not allowed to distribute contraceptives or perform abortions.”

The article also states there is a way students can obtain FREE condoms in residence halls through a student-led organization (emphasis mine):

“H*yas for Choice, an unofficial Georgetown student organization sees a need for “more information to be found out and widely known,” according to Board Member and spokesperson Kelsey Beckner, a government and English senior. Beckner has been active in H*yas for Choice since her sophomore year and a Board Member since last year. Although H*yas for Choice cannot receive funding from the University, ChoiceUSA, an organization that supports pro-choice college groups, provides financial assistance and practical advice. H*yas for Choice performs two functions at Georgetown; they promote awareness of abortion issues on campus and distribute free condoms in residence halls.”

So there you have a crystal clear statement of GU’s policy on birth control plus a method for a student to obtain free birth control (in the form of condoms).  Why is Ms. Fluke upset?  And more importantly, why is she surprised at the lack of Georgetown University provided birth control?

Of course this whole Sandra Fluke Kerfuffle is not about sex or birth control and there are two good posts here and here that speak to my take on this latest Leftist smokescreen.  It’s also obvious from this post that Ms. Fluke knew what she was doing and just wanted to pick a fight.

For me, this isn’t about sex, birth control or calling someone a ‘slut’ – It’s about the Obama administration assaulting the long held tradition of the separation of Church and State and I don’t think it will stop there. 

Because of the Obamacare mandate that requires companies provide insurance that covers birth control (“free” to the employee), this means the Federal Government can start requiring companies to provide other benefits that the Federal Government deems necessary – Free gym memberships, a treadmill in every home, Weight Watchers memberships, George Foreman grills, I can go on and on.  We know who will pay for all these free goodies – The companies (when they cover a portion of the new insurance premiums) and the employees (who will also see their insurance premiums go up). 

Just another example of our Federal government interfering with individual liberties – How’s that Hope and Change working out for you? 

The Blogosphere was very active today about the untimely and unfortunate passing of Andrew Breitbart.  I didn’t know Mr. Breitbart and only recently became involved in the Conservative movement on Twitter/Blog sites and started my own blog in September 2009.  But as I became more familiar with the “Who’s Who” of Conservative social media, I realized Mr. Breitbart’s influence was immense.

Earlier today, Erick Erickson at Red State wrote a great piece entitled “A Supernova Now Dark” which talked about the passing of Mr. Breitbart.  In that post, Mr. Erickson compared Mr. Breitbart to a supernova because of the energy he exuded:

“This brilliant ball of energy has gone dark. My and our shared prayers are for his family, friends, and colleagues who will miss his friendship, leadership, and no doubt as I have more than once received, his 3 o’clock in the morning (Eastern Time) phone calls from the Los Angeles Freeway on his way home to his wife and kids that abruptly end when he gets pulled over by the police for using his cell phone while driving. But you never had to worry. He’d call and wake you back up around 4:30 to apologize for having called so late. I speak from personal experience.”

“God bless you, Andrew.”

This was a great post but I wonder if Mr. Erickson picked up on another way the supernova analogy could be used.  Let me explain what I mean but first here is a crash course on how stars are born and how they die from a previous post of mine on the Astronomy topic:

The Crab Nebula which contains the remnants of a supernova explosion that happened over 1,000 years ago.

“The Universe (as we know it) started around 15 billion years ago with the Big Bang. This is no longer a wild theory but accepted science once the Cosmic Microwave Background was discovered. Matter condensed to form stars and through fusion, the matter was converted to Hydrogen, Helium and the rest of the elements on the periodic table. Stars go through a life cycle – they are born when they reach sufficient mass that causes them to ‘turn on’ and start fusion, they continue to burn and fuse elements deep inside their cores and then die in various ways which disperses the elements to the rest of the Cosmos. This life cycle is called Stellar Evolution and provides the explanation of life on Earth because after several generations, stars eventually fuse Carbon, Nitrogen and Oxygen which are the building blocks of life as we know it. Most likely, our Sun is at least a 2^nd generation star, formed from the remnants of several 1^st generation stars’ death. The dust cloud of our star’s birth contained the Carbon, Nitrogen and Oxygen that enabled life to form on Earth.”

We can view Mr. Breitbart’s life like a massive supernova explosion which dispersed the seeds of Conservatism to the rest of the Cosmos and eventually met up with other elements of Conservative thought from such heavyweights as William F. Buckley, Thomas Sowell and George Will.  Those elements combined in various, immeasurable areas to create other Conservative bloggers, journalists and politicians that are active today. 

I, for one, am a byproduct of those previous giants whose shoulders I am now standing and while I’m no critically acclaimed politico, I am doing what I can in the small arena I occupy to spread the Conservative message and I hope you do the same!

I like to think that the combination of two recent events: Obama’s recent appalling attempted shakedown of a private sector group (the Koch brothers) and the untimely passing of Mr. Breitbart will re-energize the Conservative base and align us at this most critical time.  The Liberal assault on American values is at an all time high so let’s pick up the sword of Mr. Breitbart and all do our part to continue the fight even if most of us only contain a small portion of the energy that he demonstrated every day.

In Ecclesiastes chapter 1, verse 9 it is written:

“What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; There is nothing new under the sun. “

That bible verse came back to me when I recently read the Federalist Paper #10.  This paper, written by James Madison in 1787, discusses how the Union is a safeguard against domestic factions and insurrections and I’ll show how the wisdom put forth to pen and paper over 200 years ago still has value today.

Madison states that when a faction arises, there are two ways to address it: remove it or control its effects.  The first part of the paper deals with the folly in trying to remove it and the later portion of the paper deals with controlling its effects. 

Removing a faction can only be done by two methods: removing Liberty (taking a totalitarian stance to remove a peoples’ right to voice their opinion) or having everyone accept the faction thereby making the faction point of view the majority point of view.  In a free society it is impossible to remove Liberty so this method should be dismissed and even in countries that don’t have Liberty, this method of removing factions has shown throughout history to be ineffective.  People, by nature, gravitate to freedom and eventually the totalitarian methods will fail to suppress the free thinkers.  Likewise, having a large, free country becoming devoid of differing opinions is impossible because of our human nature.  Differing opinions is the norm in a free society so it is foolish to think all of the citizens will be of like minds on all issues.  From the Federalist Paper:

“The second expedient is as impracticable as the first would be unwise. As long as the reason of man continues fallible, and he is at liberty to exercise it, different opinions will be formed. As long as the connection subsists between his reason and his self-love, his opinions and his passions will have a reciprocal influence on each other; and the former will be objects to which the latter will attach themselves. The diversity in the faculties of men, from which the rights of property originate, is not less an insuperable obstacle to a uniformity of interests. The protection of these faculties is the first object of government. From the protection of different and unequal faculties of acquiring property, the possession of different degrees and kinds of property immediately results; and from the influence of these on the sentiments and views of the respective proprietors, ensues a division of the society into different interests and parties.”

If we can’t remove the faction, which is something we would not want to do in a free society, then the only other option is to control its effects and this is stated so well in the paper:

“The inference to which we are brought is, that the causes of faction cannot be removed, and that relief is only to be sought in the means of controlling its effects.”

Madison spends some time showing that a Republic is better equipped to handle factions that a direct Democracy and this is very important.  In a direct Democracy, it will be easy to get mired in the minutia because every faction will have to be heard and there will be too much noise to allow for reasoned debate and voting on the issues that really matter.  A Republic, where representatives of large areas make the laws, will filter out the noise and distill the minor factions out of the public debate because the representative will have a finite amount of time and will choose to focus on the issues that are important to the majority of the people they represent.  The Republic also elects what Madison calls “fit characters” that are reasoned and more appropriate to debate the issues than the entire populous of the country.  It is debatable if we have “fit characters” elected now but that is for another discussion.

Madison then describes how the Republic can control the effects of a faction (emphasis mine):

“By what means is this object attainable? Evidently by one of two only. Either the existence of the same passion or interest in a majority at the same time must be prevented, or the majority, having such coexistent passion or interest, must be rendered, by their number and local situation, unable to concert and carry into effect schemes of oppression. If the impulse and the opportunity be suffered to coincide, we well know that neither moral nor religious motives can be relied on as an adequate control. They are not found to be such on the injustice and violence of individuals, and lose their efficacy in proportion to the number combined together, that is, in proportion as their efficacy becomes needful. “

The most obvious way to control the effects of a faction is when the interests of the faction reside solely with the minority and then the majority can prevent these dangerous interests from becoming law.  This is the second means that the Republic can control the effects of a faction but I want to focus on the first means that is highlighted in bold text above.

If the faction interests reside in the majority, then the representatives of the majority must be wise enough to suppress those notions for the betterment of the Union and this is a key point and something that is relevant today.  During the recent past, Republicans in Name Only (RINO’s) and Democrats have not prevented the dangerous interests of a majority which I characterize as relating to increased government spending and expanded entitlement programs.  Madison assumed that ‘fit characters’ would rise above the disastrous faction interests even when a majority of the country wanted them but this has not been the case in the past few decades.  A significant percentage of the population might like government handouts in exchange for not working but “fit characters” should’ve realized that fostering a Republic where 90% of federal income tax revenues go to pay for Social Security, Welfare, Medicare, Medicaid and Unemployment Insurance is dangerous to the Republic and should have rejected legislation that supports this scheme of oppression.

In America’s history, when such dangerous interests such as slavery or segregation were present in the a large percentage of the population, the “‘fit characters” didn’t do the right thing in passing legislation to prevent these atrocities.  In more recent times, the RINO’s and Democrats didn’t resist the interests of many Americans to move to a more socialistic lifestyle with increased government entitlements and passage of a socialized health care system called Obamacare.  With Slavery and Segregation, it took a while to get it right but in the end we eventually came to the correct position and it is my hope that the Republic will eventually get things right and reverse our socialistic tendencies by reducing entitlement programs, government over regulation and our national debt.  I still have faith in America and the rise of the Tea Party and electing candidates that resist these dangerous interests validates my faith that America will return to its Free Market roots.

Demands for more government handouts and increased entitlements are coming from a larger percentage of our population and I would call this a dangerous faction that is intent on fundamentally transforming our Union.  Occupy Wall Street, the fight in Wisconsin over the ‘right’ for employee public service unions to collective bargain and the Income inequality meme are all evidence of factions that seek to destroy the American way of life and put us on a path that Greece is on right now.  Madison is right that the Republic can only control these dangerous factions if the “fit characters” rise up to the calling of their office and pass legislation that negates these dangerous doctrines of the Left.

In closing, I leave you with the second to last paragraph from this Federalist Paper and this is why I say there is nothing new under the Sun (my emphasis in bold):

“The influence of factious leaders may kindle a flame within their particular States, but will be unable to spread a general conflagration through the other States. A religious sect may degenerate into a political faction in a part of the Confederacy; but the variety of sects dispersed over the entire face of it must secure the national councils against any danger from that source. A rage for paper money, for an abolition of debts, for an equal division of property, or for any other improper or wicked project, will be less apt to pervade the whole body of the Union than a particular member of it; in the same proportion as such a malady is more likely to taint a particular county or district, than an entire State.”

Let’s hope that “the whole body of the Union” rises up and stops this dangerous and ignorant transition from Capitalism to Socialism.