During his presidential campaign, Barack Obama repeatedly promised a new tone in Washington, an open, fair, and purpose-driven agenda with a bipartisan spirit. Instead, the tone is Washington has not only reached its lowest partisan ebb, perhaps ever, but the ‘legislative process’ under Harry Reid has deteriorated into naked bribery and ideological prostitution. While Mary Landreiu and Blanche Lincoln have showed themselves to be up for purchase, no member of the U.S. Senate has so drastically sold his soul and abandoned his principles as has Nebraska’s Ben Nelson.

Throughout the’ health care reform’ process, Nelson had been relatively up-front in voicing his objections to the bill, not merely because of his pro-life convictions, but because of the bill’s very nature. The most important insight into Nelson’s thinking emerged last week, following the effective failure of the so-called ‘public option’ along with the proposed Medicare buy-in for people as young as 55. In voicing his remaining concerns, Nelson put his finger not only on the great unknown – the ultimate cost of the program, but more fundamentally, the ultimate aim of the legislation:

“We don’t know what it’s going to cost. The second thing is I’m concerned that it’s– it’s the forerunner of single-payer, the ultimate singer single-payer plan, maybe even more directly than the public option.”

Nelson had repeatedly made clear his opposition to a single-payer system; one that would radically and fundamentally alter the relationship between the American people and their federal government. Far from unfounded, Nelson’s fears were right on target, for the proposed legislation is nothing short of the foundation upon which the greatest power-grab in American history will be built. President Barack Obama has spoken of his ultimate desire to bring about ‘redistributive change’ and has repeatedly voiced his support for a ‘single-payer system,’ and every Washington observer over the age of ten understands that once in place this legislation will be difficult to reverse and subject to alterations and expansion at the political whims of future Congresses – especially ones adept at never wasting a ‘good crisis’ in pushing through sweeping reform – perhaps something like the impending insolvency of Medicare in 2017.

Given these realities, and Nelson’s own adroit observation, his decision to reverse course and embrace this single-payer in sheep’s clothing for a price that Harry Reid was willing to pay is astonishing. Far from a new means of doing business in Washington, we have seen the convergence of the oldest and second oldest professions in ways impossible before the modern death of concepts like shame. Nelson knows his head won’t be on the platter in next year’s massacre of the Democrats at the polls – he’s not up for reelection until 2012 – while the honorable Blanche Lincoln will get hers, Nelson figures he’ll be off the hook thanks to American’s notoriously short attention span and a sweetheart deal for his own constituents.

He couldn’t be more wrong. Nelson will get his too.

Before that time comes however, there is a token of appreciation that all Americans can send Senator Nelson to remind him of how much we appreciate the federal takeover of our health care system that he allowed, despite his own convictions, and for a price. If Senator Nelson wishes to act the part of a prostitute, we encourage our fellow Americans to take a few moments out of their busy schedule to give him the chance by sending Senator Nelson a token of our appreciation for his newfound role: we recommend fishnet stockings, pantyhose and ladies panties, which can be sent to the senator at his D.C. office:

Senator Ben Nelson
720 Hart Senate Office Building
United States Senate
Washington, DC 20510

Enjoy the panties and fishnets senator, you’ve earned them. See you in 2012.

Amidst backslapping, vote tallying and questionable deal-making on Capitol Hill regarding the imminent passage of what is being called health care reform, few people, including constitutional scholars have weighed in. On the one hand, their reluctance to voice an opinion is understandable considering that the bill is something of an esoteric document. To date, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has yet to unveil this massive bill, that is, even if he’s finished writing it, in a process that all objective observers agree has been byzantine at best. Still, we can gather enough information from the broad outlines of the legislation to take a crack at its constitutionality.

As reported in the press, the bill will utilize the Commerce Clause in Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution to provide the legal basis for regulation in this area. This is hardly surprising since this grossly misconstrued provision is used to regulate almost every aspect of American life that is otherwise off limits to federal authority – the 10th Amendment notwithstanding. It is unclear precisely what approach will be taken here, but at a fundamental level it appears that the bill will require every American (and possibly non-citizen residents) to purchase, with their own money, a commodity (health insurance) from a private company, and penalize them with a tax if they do not. If this is indeed the bill’s basic structure, and that still remains a significant question, there can be little doubt that the product of what President Obama has called a “century-long struggle” is profoundly unconstitutional.

There is simply no basis in the United States Constitution that would provide the federal government with the power to force individuals to purchase commodities. While states have sufficient authority to mandate insurance based on their general legislative power, the federal government’s defined powers don’t provide for any legitimate mechanism to impose this burden. Moreover, the provision meant to enforce so-called universal coverage is being called a tax, but in reality only falls on those individuals who don’t purchase health insurance. Thus, what is deemed a tax is in fact a penalty, which runs directly afoul of the Bill of Attainder prohibition located in Article I, Section 9 of the Constitution.

Thus, the basic provisions of this bill don’t seem to pass constitutional muster on their face. While many liberals are rejoicing, and conservatives fretting about this massive government reordering or nearly 1/6 of the American economy, the only true accomplishment of this legislation may be as a jobs stimulus for constitutional lawyers who are sure to spend months and years fighting over its legality – a period in which Congressional majorities and even White House occupants may well change.

Every now and then you come across an opinion piece written by someone on the Left that opens your eyes. Such was the case for a recent tome written for the Huffington Post by a gentleman named Evan Handler. Written in response to comments to an earlier essay, and in obvious haste and frustration, and so with considerable passion, his piece is an unvarnished look at the true thinking of the modern American Left, the so-called ‘progressives.’ Their vision of America is nothing short of radical and fundamental social and economic revolution – the total remaking of America – wrapped in a self-righteous package and delivered via government coercion. I encourage all of your to read it.
Handler’s article is entitled “America, I Love You. Americans, On the Other Hand…,” which is a sentiment that is both revealing and commonplace on the Left. Leftists like Handler love America, but as the title makes clear, he doesn’t love its people, we Americans. As the article further demonstrates, Leftists like Handler don’t much love its history, which they view mostly in terms of missed opportunities -the ugly realities being merely a train of quasi-imperialist human rights abuses driven by capitalist avarice. Handler, like most Leftists, doesn’t regard the present America with anything other than disdain – referring to our country as a racist, uncaring, international embarrassment.

Maybe Handler does love America, but if he doesn’t love its people, much of its past or its present, one has to wonder what part of America he and his Leftists do love? It is here I am reminded of a comment by a prominent American Leftist, who when asked what he loved about America, paused thoughtfully, and remarked revealingly, on his admiration for the American continent…as a land mass. Yes, the Leftists love America’s lakes, mountains, and rivers…it’s the rest of America they can’t stand.

The point isn’t to demonize Handler, but rather to demonstrate how much Handler and his allies daily demonize you; how much they regard you and the country you love as fundamentally misguided and in need of desperate and radical change based on their judgments about how the world “should be.” Thus we arrive at the formulaic heart of all progressive thinking: modern America is a nasty place, it needs to be changed by progressives into something they like better, and the government is the coercive means to that end. There is one more piece to the formula too, and it’s important when considering Handler’s profanity-laden article. Remember that the progressives see themselves as morally correct in their judgments, and that sense of self-righteousness must be fostered in order to motivate them to tackle the difficult task of radically reforming a change-resistant society. Thus, their viewpoint requires them both to believe in the righteousness of their cause and in the pure malevolence of those who oppose them. The result is that every effort is made at every opportunity to demonize those who stand in their way, hence his branding of all of us who don’t agree with him as ‘idiots’ and the introduction to the body of his article:
“First, to those opposed to any European-styled government subsidized health insurance option: I found every one of your arguments to be small-minded, selfish, fear-driven, ill-informed, self-serving, and — most crucially — detrimental to the long-term interests of the United States of America.”

As if someone so evidentially disdainful of everything uniquely American would somehow be an adequate or appropriate judge of what is in America’s best long-term interests.

Handler’s argument for why federally mandated and run health insurance is now essential, is contained in his earlier article, entitled, “Have You No Decency, Sir? At Long Last, Have You No Sense of Decency?” It is instructive to note that the title is a reference to Senator Joe McCarthy, a man the liberals love to hate, even 50 years after his death, and while they condemn his tactics, they employ them without hypocrisy at every step, in what columnist George Will has called ‘liberal McCarthyism,” – hence the notion that all those who disagree with President Obama must be motivated by racism.

With that basis in mind, let’s take a look at the substance of Handler’s arguments about why America requires a federal health insurance program, and here it is:

“…giving health care insurance to the most people possible is a very good thing to do. That’s why every other advanced nation on planet Earth does it — and most of them have far greater health than we enjoy, and spend much less on keeping it that way.”

That’s it folks. I’m afraid there’s not much more to it than that. Handler and his progressives think it’s ”a very good thing to do,” and that in the land of milk and honey – socialized Europe – it works just great…all evidence to the contrary notwithstanding.

How persuasive.

The rest of Handler’s article is devoted to excoriating Rep. Joe Wilson who (accurately) called attention to President Obama’s misleading assertions about health care benefits going to illegal aliens. As we now know, in addition to telling a whopper of a false anecdote about Otto Radditz, the man Obama claimed died as a result of being denied coverage by his evil insurer (he didn’t die, and his private insurance prolonged his life for 3 years), Obama claimed that the bill wouldn’t benefit non-citizen illegal aliens. We now know of course that like all government programs, enforcement is where the rubber meets the road; without an enforcement mechanism, limitations on beneficiaries are totally meaningless. It’s rather like saying that because robbery has been made illegal, it will never happen. Republicans in Congress tried to add amendments to the bill that would have provided for an enforcement mechanism (a requirement to show proof of U.S. citizenship), but the Democrats refused to include it knowing full-well that it would result in illegal aliens (an important future, and many say current voting block for the Democrats), being given access to health care that you and I pay for. In other words, break our laws by coming here illegally, stay as long as you like, don’t pay any income taxes, and get free education and health care on us as a reward. In the mind of the progressive, this is the world as it should be.

Of course, there we go being uncharitable again just like they say, but then it isn’t really charity were talking about is it? What Handler and his friends seek is not charitable giving – a voluntary act of compassion – it’s the government being empowered to take money you’ve earned and give it to someone Handler and his friends feel is more worthy – from each according to his ability, to each according to his need(citizen or not). It’s always easy to be “charitable” with someone else’s money isn’t it?

Unfortunately for Handler and his progressives, that inexplicable resistance they’re encountering on the part of the American people, belies an ideology grounded in a concept they cannot understand or accept – the American concept of a limited government. Handler implores his readers to have faith in the government: “I just encourage you all to look at it another way. Not how the government has failed you to this point, but at what the government might be offering now to improve upon the past.” It’s rather like hearing a recidivist wife-beater tell his spouse to have faith in his proposed pacifism. Handler’s naïve notion of government suddenly becoming responsible, efficient and self-limiting ignores 5,000 years of recorded human history with government, and is directly opposed both in spirit and substance to that pesky little document, the U.S. Constitution.

This of course is at the heart of the debate. For progressives, the Constitution is like a salad bar, a body of rules that you can pick and choose from, and even change as you like. Fundamental rights can be curtailed, interpreted, even abolished as long as it fits their concept of evolving standards of progressivism. For the rest of us, the Constitution is the supreme law of the land, the guarantor of our sacred liberties, and a document with actual meaning. The Constitution is not some aspirational mission statement, it’s a contract between the people about what their government can and cannot do. If it’s anything else, it’s totally meaningless. What the Leftists can’t understand, or don’t want you to recognize, is that our limited form of government is the essence of America; it is a government of laws, not men, and it exists for a very limited purpose – to do those things a government must do, and nothing more.

Handler likes to point out that we are all immigrants to this land, but seems to decry the very American-ness that drove millions upon millions of us to come here. A land of unlimited opportunity thanks to a people who pride themselves on hard work and personal responsibility and a system of limited government that allows each man and woman to live his or her life as he or she sees fit; free to make the choices best for themselves and their families. Handler’s America is just the opposite. It is a land of government bureaucracy making choices for you with your money, and forcing you to conform to a lifestyle Handler approves of – it is the essence of the tyranny America was founded in opposition to. For Handler, government, big government, is absolutely essential – we are not only dependent upon it, but we are beholden to it. In his own words, “As corrupt and inefficient as your government is (and it clearly is), it’s the only thing keeping you alive moment to moment.”

One can imagine the likes of Kim Jong Il agreeing wholeheartedly.

Handler’s passion is to be admired, his motivations perhaps understood, but Handler’s methods, like those of so many zealous reformers before him, is not the road to a better society, but a path to bondage. No doubt like his political heroes, Handler makes the crucial error of prizing an elusive equality over an imperfect liberty. Handler would do well to remember the words of that famous European observer Alexis de Toqueville who wrote: “Democracy and socialism have nothing in common but one word, equality. But notice the difference: while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude.” Despite his contentions to the contrary, at some level Handler must know this. Thus, while he speaks glowingly of European progressivism, he and his European wife make their home here in America, and he makes his living writing and speaking his mind freely – a right still not wholly enjoyed by the people of modern, progressive, Europe.

To those who have considered whether federal health care is worth the risks, consider the essence of the argument being put before you: A political minority in the country, which currently holds a political majority in the government, wants to impose, through a party-line legislative procedure never before used, a mandate upon you to purchase health insurance from their government program, whether or not you want to…and will penalize you if you do not. The ask you to take this step willingly, despite the fact that our constitution does not authorize it, and despite the fact that it will place them in effective control of 13% of our entire economy. They ask you to do so on the strength of their assurances that this program will work well, despite the legendary inefficiency and profligate wastefulness of a government that they concede is corrupt. They ask you to believe that it will somehow cost us all far less than we’re paying now, while preserving the quality of health care that our free market gave to us – a quality not enjoyed by any nation with the kind of system they wish to adopt. Oh, and one more thing, they haven’t yet figured out how they’re going to pay for it, but this ruling elite knows it will somehow not add to the nearly insurmountable debt which they have already piled upon us.

The argument in favor of federal health care is more than preposterous, it’s a duplicitous fantasy. It is perpetrated by those who dislike the America we love, and it is designed to replace a system of liberty with one of equality – a system where the government is, quite literally, the only thing keeping you alive, moment to moment. We would do well to remember our obligation to those who went before us and who bequeathed to us the liberties we enjoy, as well as to those who will follow us, those who depend upon our courage, our intelligence and our love of liberty to provide them with theirs. We would do well to remember the words of Thomas Jefferson who declared, “I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.”

So what are we to do? Surely there must be some answer to making our excellent health care a little more affordable? There is, and instinctively, every common-sense, liberty-loving American knows the answer. It’s the answer we have relied upon time and again, the answer that has transformed a frontier nation of destitute immigrants into the wealthiest, strongest, and most free nation ever to grace our world – let us each make our own choices! If you don’t want to buy health insurance, the federal government of the United States should not make you. If you live in California and want to buy insurance from a company in Florida, the federal government of the United States should not prevent you. If you and your neighbor want to pool your resources to gain greater bargaining power, Congress shouldn’t stop you. If your doctor doesn’t feel you need superfluous tests, he should be forced to administer them out of fear of lawsuits.

The answers to our health care dilemma are out there, and they don’t need more than 50 new government bureaucracies and nine hundred billion dollars of your money to be discovered. It merely requires each of us to remember our history as Americans, our obligations as citizens, and our God-given right to make our own choices as free people.

During the election we were force fed the idea that Obama would take office and things would change. We were told that the change would be important, it would not be granular changes, but large philosophical changes. The left bought this hook line and sinker.

Let’s look at the broad picture.

The left hated Geo. W Bush because he used the events of 9/11 as pre-text to further a neo-conservative foreign policy.

So what does Obama do do in his first month in office? He uses the economic crisis as pre-text to roll out a leftist economic agenda and democratic spending package.

It was this “false” pre-text of 9/11 that caused the left to latch onto Obama for he was going to light the way and steer us clear of typical Washington politics. No, God forbid anyone question the President or any democrat about this double standard

What is amazing is that the left did not have buy into this charade. Many rational Americans saw through Obama’s thin veneer. The left had an option: Hillary. As much as I dislike her, I don’t think she is a wolf in sheeps clothing, she is just a wolf. In this administration she and Geithner are about the only rational people in the WHite House. In any event, regardless of who would have won the democratic ticket we would have had the same economic policies as it was Pelosi and Reid who developed the recovery package, not the savior Obama. He was just too weak willed to come out against the plastic usrgery machine that is Nancy Pelosi.

CNN is reporting that the Obama adminstration will maintain the Bush administrations policies regarding detainees in Afghanistan. Wait … what?

I guess Bush got something right:

“WASHINGTON (CNN) — The Obama administration told a federal court late Friday it will maintain the Bush administration’s position that battlefield detainees held without charges by the United States in Afghanistan are not entitled to constitutional rights to challenge their detention.”

Source

Its the change the left has been looking for.

These are facts, published by Fox News, buried by fearmongering lefties and redistributed by Canadians. It is a fair story that points out shortcomings of GOPers and dems. Amazing that we have to say that.

Will the people of Massachusetts vote out the bumbling fool Barney Frank already? Seriously. We do not care if you elected another Democrat (actually we do, but this is just to make a point). Franks is an idiot and makes Massachusettsians looks foolish as well.

The Bush Admin and Senator McCain warned repeatedly about Fanny Mae and Freddy Mac and what thus became the 2008 financial crisis — starting in 2002 (and actually even earlier — in the Clinton and Carter White Houses. Democrats resisted and kept to their party line, extending loans to people who couldn’t afford them — just like you would expect of socialists.

Obama is playing the American Public for fools and the media is falling for it. Just look at what he says and what he does. It is absolutely stunning that he is getting away with this. I think its a game for him to see how far he can push things:

First, the Messiah, puts on a document on a White House web page saying that he will ” … will ban earmarks from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act that will soon go before Congress.”

Then he goes to the Democratic retreat and all but brags about the pet projects in the bill:
“Then there’s the argument that this is filled with pet projects. When was the last time that we saw a bill of this magnitude move out with no earmarks in it? Not one (Applause)” (we posted the video here)

Then, Yesterday, he talks to some folks in Indiana and “… bragged about getting Congress to produce a package with no pork, yet boasted it will do good things for a Hoosier highway and a downtown overpass, just the kind of local projects lawmakers lard into big spending bills”.

A liberal friend of mind said “it just symantics”. that’s right. This is flat out playing loose with words to trick the American public into buying the idea that Pelosi’s plan to spend unprecedented amounts of money is the right – and only – course to take.

This guy is playing us for fools; and this is just one small issue.

This is cool,

Read this, then watch this at abount 1:46. What a fool the American people were to buy into this idiot’s rhetoric and lack of leadership.

Just when it seemed the Republican Party had breathed its last breath, an amazing thing happened: the one-time fiscally conservative, small-government party of yesterday briefly re-ignited. In a vote every conservative can be proud of, the House Republicans, thanks to the efforts of new Minority Whip Eric Cantor, unanimously voted against the crippling spending bill pushed by President Obama and his big-government allies.  Of course it took the mother of all pork-barrel bills, with a crippling cost of more than $1.1 trillion that is sure to wreck the economy and drive up inflation to do it, but at least they ‘got religion’ eventually.

Now the real fight begins. If the Republican Party is to find its true voice, there needs to be a unanimous rejection of this socialist monster of a bill when it arrives in the Senate. Can we accomplish it? Will we stand united on principle? It’s up to you. Our representatives in the Senate need to hear from you, especially those most likely to abandon our core principles. You can reach them by calling the Senate Switchboard and asking to be connected (202) 224-3121 or toll free (866) 220-0044.

 If you can only make one or two calls, please start with these Senators:

• Collins, Susan
• Graham, Lindsey
• McCain, John
• Snowe, Olympia
• Voinovich, George

 The following are newly elected Republican Senators, so their predisposition toward fiscal responsibility and small government is not known.  We are certain they would benefit from hearing from you:

• Johanns, Mike
• Risch, Jim

The following are regarded as being, ‘at risk’ because of their previous support of the original bailout package (HR 1424):

• Alexander, Lamar
• Bennett, Robert
• Bond, Kit
• Burr, Richard
• Chambliss, Saxby
• Coburn, Tom
• Corker, Bob
• Cornyn, John
• Ensign, John
• Grassley, Chuck
• Gregg, Judd
• Hatch, Orrin
• Hutchison, Kay Bailey
• Isakson, Johnny
• Kyl, Jon
• Lugar, Richard
• Martinez, Mel
• McConnell, Mitch
• Murkowski, Lisa
• Specter, Arlen
• Thune, John

The following Senators are the ones we believe are least likely to vote for this irresponsible bill. We are counting on their principled opposition to fiscal irresponsibility:

• Barrasso, John
• Brownback, Sam
• Bunning, Jim
• Cochran, Thad
• Crapo, Mike
• DeMint, Jim
• Enzi, Mike
• Inhofe, Jim
• Johanns, Mike
• Roberts, Pat
• Sessions, Jeff
• Shelby, Richard
• Vitter, David
• Wicker, Roger

It is hard not to envy people like entrepreneurs or those of faith who are eternally optimistic, who always find the bright side, for whom the glass is more than just half full even in darkest times but filled to overflowing during the best of them. Those people make things work in spite of obstacles, which they see as opportunities. When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.
For me, this feeling of dread won’t go away, as if told we had two to four years before an asteroid obliterates all life on Earth. While no official bureaucracy will confirm or deny the world is ending, the world we know is on its way out, barring a miracle. Indeed, we have been told by the President–Elect that change is coming. He said we can believe in it, which his supporters interpret to mean it will be a good thing. Familiarity with the concepts of good and evil suggest otherwise.
How to recover our optimism? Just go along to get along? Sacrifice liberty in the name of unity? That is what’s in store, and the common word for it is socialism. Words from the immortal (for now) Gettysburg Address come to mind:
“Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation: conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war. . .testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated. . . can long endure.” Read more »