Further Thoughts About the California Governor Race and What the Tea Parties Have Given Us Everywhere

In reviewing my decision (explained in the preceding post) to not vote for or support the Republican candidate seeking to become California's next governor, it occurred to me that she talks about cutting the costs of government because those costs have become unaffordable. 

The same thing seems to be true of other GOP establishment candidates nationwide.

Were tax receipts to rise with an improving economy, one has to wonder how many of these candidates would revert to "big government conservatives." This is what we got the last time Republicans controlled the government's legislative branch. When they took over, the GOPers went on a sustained spending spree that squandered even more of the nation's wealth than had their Democrat predecessors.

The inescapable conclusion is that all establishment politicians, irrespective party affiliations, are careerists who will endeavor to perpetuate their positions by using the public treasury to buy supportive constituencies.

None of them gives any sign of actually believing that GOVERNMENT THAT GOVERNS LEAST GOVERNS BEST.

That notion of the nation's founders appears to be a common mindset of the upstart candidates brought into the fray by the Tea Parties. Thus the Tea Parties are offering us an opportunity that does not exist when only establishment candidates are on the ballot and all we can do is to try to pick the lesser of two evils.

No longer Going For The Lesser Of Two Evils

Having survived past the supposed allotment of three score years and ten, I'm fed up with selecting one of two almost equally abhorrent election candidates.

For anyone who is interested, I will not be voting for either Brown or Whitman to become California's next governor. 

Whitman has some good sensible arguments on financial matters which are important as California is melting down economically. But she is a staunch gun grabber and a liberal on all social issues; while I don't much care about the latter, as a committed civil rights and second amendment supporter, the former is a show stopper for me. Also, California's political establishment has created a fiscal abyss from which the state can no longer escape anyway except through bankruptcy.

Brown is a longtime liberal and an economic ignoramus who has spent his life at the public or his family's trough. On the plus side, he did once -- long ago, to be sure -- take a principled position on the second amendment. But he has long been and continues to be beholden to union bosses, and, in particular, to the corrupt rulers of the public employees unions responsible for bankrupting the state. Finally and most importantly, he has been derelict in the performance of his duty as California's attorney general. He has abandoned the defense of the voter adopted ban on gay marriages, leaving the voters unrepresented in the federal courts in which the constitutionality of the measure is being challenged by its opponents.

As we unfortunately do not have the ability to vote for None of the Above, I will be voting for a candidate of one of the minor parties, probably the Libertarian or American Independent, who of course has no chance of winning election. Therefore, in contrast to whichever of the major party hopefuls ends up as California's governor, the candidate who ends up getting my vote at least will do no harm to anyone or to the body politic. 

Why They Run

The reason politicians try so hard to get  reelected is that they would hate to have to try to make a  living under the laws they've passed.

Shamefully Led by Degenerate Wimps

What passes for leadership in America's current governmental, elite educational, and media institutions is abjectly bowing and scraping to our Islamist adversaries and their insane Sharia law delusions. Our oligarchs seem to be trying to transform the nation into the land of the servile and the home of the fearful. The constant unprincipled deferrals to those hostiles to us constitutes appeasement and is spelled out by the always clear headed Mark Steyn in this essay in which he describes how the nation's corrupt ruling class is shamefully betraying the traditions and heritage that we should be defending and upholding with pride.

Proof of the Truism that a Messy Desk Reflects a Brilliant and Active Mind

William F. Buckley's Desk

Nat Hentoff's Desk

Einstein's Desk

Guess Who

As True and Relevant Today as 334 Years Ago

Society in every state is a blessing, but government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one; for when we suffer or are exposed to the same miseries by a government, which we might expect in a country without government, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer.

. . . Thomas Paine, Common Sense, 1776

Stupid Is as Stupid Does

The following is offered as a rejoinder to the blindly loyal GOP adherents who have objected to my having characterized the party's hierarchy as stupid:

The Republican leadership in the U.S. Senate is allowing Alaska's lame duck earmark queen to retain her choice committee positions even though her efforts to win reelection were rejected by her home state's Republican voters. She was defeated in Alaska's Republican primary which resulted in the nomination of a truly illustrious conservative candidate. Leaving the rejected establishment senator in her committee posts is a slap in the face of those who favored the winning candidate, including  the Tea Parties and Sarah Palin. This is particularly true since the establishment reject, instead of accepting the judgment of the voters, now is running as an independent write in campaign against the party's candidate for the seat -- a Quixotic endeavor that has scant chances of success but could undermine GOP's ability to retain the position by giving the Democrat candidate a shot at winning it.

In these circumstances, allowing the rejected senator to retain her committee positions isn't stupid?

The Necessary Tea Parties

Governmental powers have become bloated as the exclusive property of either one or both of two corrupt and self serving establishment parties -- the Democrats, who are truly evil and somewhat stupid, and/or the Republicans, who are truly stupid and somewhat evil. Unlike ordinary citizens to whom they pay lip service but really ignore, the insiders of both parties reject the vision of our nation's founders and the great gift of the Constitution that they bestowed upon us.

This is beginning to be corrected by the Tea Parties, as is detailed in this superb essay, which explains what is taking place and why the threatened establishment elitists are so vehemently attacking the spontaneous uprising of the American people and doing everything possible to demonize the upstart candidates favored by the Tea Partiers.

A Warrior's Wise Observation

Men who fight, learn much. 

Men who send others to fight, learn  little!

Counting on P. T. Barnum

A couple of the better and more popular portions of  Obamacare are kicking about now and are being heralded with great joy by the Chosen One and his minions. Counting on Mr. Barnum's observation that there's a sucker born every minute, they are making no mention of the attendant costs or who is going to be paying them. Instead, the benefits are being presented as something that is being bestowed for free by a beneficent government.

For a more realistic look at the costs and who is going to be bearing them, see this Wall Street Journal report.

The fact that many older Americans are going to be left without health care is going to have an added benefit for the government. This will spare the public treasury some expenditures as many more senior citizens will shuffle off this mortal coil before they can collect much in the way of Social Security retirement benefits.

Notwithstanding the joyous crowings being emitted by the White House and the apt observation of P. T. Barnum, it appears that not one of the Democrats who passed the abominable health care legislation are mentioning it in their campaigns to win reelection to Congress. Every one of them is claiming to be independent from Mr. Obama's signature achievement as well as from Light Weight Harry Reid in the case of senators and Nasty Nancy Pelosi in the case of members of the House of Reprehensibles. It appears that the legislation was enacted and that Mr. Reid and the broomstick riding Mrs. Pelosi were elected to their leadership positions by immaculately cast votes.

Hunh ? ? ? ?

Takes on the Tea Parties

The always coherent Peggy Noonan -- who writes so clearly because that's the way she thinks -- sets out here how and why the Tea Parties are performing a vital role in the nation's political life today. The Wall Street Journal essay also spells out the major challenges that lie ahead for the Tea Parties.

And, surprisingly, The New York Times published this balanced analysis of the Tea Parties and of the criticisms being directed at them and the candidates they have (successfully) supported.

Sore Losing RINOs

Liberal and supposedly moderate Republicans seem unable to take no for an answer and to be unwilling to accept rejection by their party's voters.

Thus, when it became clear to Florida's wobbly GOP governor that he couldn't win his party's nomination to become its candidate for election to the U.S. Senate, he abandoned the party and is running for that office as an independent candidate.

Similarly, having lost her party's primary for nomination to run for reelection, Alaska's woman senator -- an office that was bestowed upon her as a gift from her RINO Republican father, who, as governor, appointed her to the office --  now is campaigning for reelection to the office as a write in candidate.

Neither of these sore losers is going to be elected to the Senate, but that's not their purpose. The sore heads simply want to undermine the election prospects of the conservative Republican candidates who defeated them in their efforts to win their party's nomination . . . and they prefer a Democrat victory  to one by the candidate chosen by the voters of their own former party.

Conservative Republicans should remember these examples the next time they are asked to join forces and unite behind a liberal or moderate GOP candidate for any office.

Now Showing Everywhere

Another Knickers Bunching Atrocity

Across the political spectrum those who assume they have a divine right -- notwithstanding that they don't believe in God -- to rule us and run everything are upset and angry again, obviously feeling that their status is being threatened.

Members of the ruling class (establishment politicians, pundits, academicians, network talking heads, other passe media journalists, etc) are aghast at the Delaware Republican primary defeat of one of their self  anointed group by an upstart ordinary American woman who is running for the senate espousing-- horror of horrors -- traditional American values.

If, as they claim, she can't possibly win why are they so upset by her presumptive effrontery? 

Just imagine if unwashed hordes of ordinary citizens were to begin acting the same way. Why they might even overthrow their establishment betters and remove the elitists from the public trough from which the oligarchs are entitled to extract and enjoy goodies throughout their lives. A government of ordinary people might even restore common sense to government and limit it to the size and scope provided for by the Constitution.

Let's Insist on Reciprocity

Want a mosque proximate to Ground Zero?

Fine . . . as soon as churches and synagogues can be established in Mecca or, for that matter, anywhere else in Saudi Arabia.

Fair's fair after all . . . even if our otherwise vocal homegrown supporters of the Islamic beachhead are curiously silent on the subject.

Another Poke in the Eye from the White House

Thanks to the wrecking crew that is running the executive branch of what used to be our government, the country now has what The Wall Street Journal accurately describes as "a bureau inside an agency (the Fed) that it doesn't report to, with a budget not subject to Congressional control [with] a leader not subject to Senate confirmation" noting that "[i]f Dick Cheney had tried this, he'd have been accused of staging a coup." The full story can be seen here.

Logic 101

Below is an interesting letter in the past week's Australian Shooter Magazine that was forwarded to us by one of the proprietors of City Arms, the excellent Pacifica, California, firearms store:                             
                                                

If you consider that there has been an average of 160,000 troops in the Iraq Theater of operations during the past 22 months, and a total of 2,112 deaths, that gives a firearm death rate of 60 per 100,000 soldiers.

The firearm death rate in Washington , DC, is 80.6 per 100,000 for the same period.  That means you are about 25 per cent more likely to be shot and killed in the US capital, which has some of the strictest gun control laws in the U.S. , than you are in Iraq .

Conclusion: The U.S. should pull out of Washington.

Demo Rats In Panic

Having overburdened the ship of state to the point that it is foundering in a sea of red ink, the Demo Rats are scurrying to abandon it.

They are running from their records and from their president and hoping that by attacking those running for election against them they will divert voter attention from the sleazy way they have violated their oaths of office.

This essay describing the irresponsible Demo Rats' efforts to escape accountability for their disgraceful conduct would be hilarious were not the rest of us being left with the need to try to right the ship and keep it from sinking.

A Shakedown That Would Shame Even Bismarck

Otto Von Bismarck, the Prussian who forged and became the Iron Chancellor of the German Empire, is reputed to have observed that:

People Sleep Better at night

if they do not know how

their laws and their sausages

are made.

He would recoil with horror at revelations such as those contained in this report of the shabby shakedowns currently being attempted by congressional leaders desperately trying to cling to power.

Progessivism, Liberalism, and Socialism Share Common Alien Roots

Progressives, liberals, and socialists share and depend on a single basic ideology: government without limits. That is why they are so hostile to the American Constitution that provides for individual freedom by placing limits on what government can do. This essay delineates the competing ideologies, and traces the domestic history of the "anything goes" concept of government -- that today's progressives no longer hesitate to espouse openly -- from its importation from its alien roots more than a century ago to date.

Suddenly They Care . . . and Their Concern is Touching

Now that the Tea Parties have swept the primary tables in almost every state in which they participated in the political games, members of the ruling class and their media minions are agape with concern.

Some are expressing joy at the Tea Party victories, claiming that their successful candidates are so extremely conservative that their nominations guarantee that their liberal Democrat opponents will prevail and emerge as winners in the general election. Being an old codger, I recall being bombarded with the same message when Ronald Reagan won the Republican nomination for the presidency. He couldn't possibly win and therefore . . . . Oh Joy; Oh Rapture ! ! ! !

Other statists are expressing concern that the Tea Party successes will divide and otherwise damage and undermine the Republican Party. Isn't it touching to see their suddenly developed concern for the health and welfare of the GOP?

Underlying all this hypocrisy is a real concern -- a concern by the careerists dependent on being able to use the public treasury to buy constituencies and thus to feed endlessly at the public trough that ordinary Americans have had enough and are rising up to overthrow the elitist insiders and restore the limited government of the people that the nation's founders prescribed for the country when they wrote the Constitution.

A Smidgen of Forgotten Wisdom

The following observation about the Constitution that makes the United States exceptional is from a 1926 dissenting opinion by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis:  

The doctrine of the separation of powers was adopted by the Convention of 1787  not to promote efficiency but to preclude the exercise of arbitrary power.  The purpose was, not to avoid friction, but, by means of the inevitable friction incident to the distribution of governmental powers among three departments, to save the people from autocracy.

Guess Who's Not Paying Their Fair Share

It seems that those who work for the guvmnt don't consider themselves to be among the "little people" who pay taxes, according to this report from -- surprise -- the Washington Post.

New Jersey's Fearless Governor Confronts Teachers Union With the Truth

Comedians Signal Honeymoon's End

The liberals are asking us to give Obama time. We agree . . . and think 25 to life would be appropriate. 

. . . Jay Leno

America needs Obama-care like Nancy Pelosi needs a Halloween mask.

. . . Jay Leno

Q: Have you heard about McDonald's' new Obama Value Meal?
A: Order anything you like and the guy behind you has to pay for it.

. . . Conan O'Brien

Q: What does Barack Obama call lunch with a convicted felon?
A: A fund raiser.

. . . Jay Leno

Q: What's the difference between Obama's cabinet and a penitentiary?
A: One is filled with tax evaders, blackmailers, and threats to society. The other is for housing prisoners.

. . . David Letterman

Q: If Nancy Pelosi and Obama were on a boat in the middle of the ocean and it started to sink, who would be saved?
A: America !

. . . Jimmy Fallon

Q: What's the difference between Obama and his dog, Bo?
A: Bo has papers.

. . . Jimmy Kimmel

Q: What was the most positive result of the "Cash for Clunkers" program?
A: It took 95% of the Obama bumper stickers off the road.

. . . David Letterman

Well Worth Watching Again

A Thank You From Our Queen

For only the second time in my adult life, I am not ashamed of my country. I want to thank the hard working American people for  paying $242 thousand dollars plus additional expenses for my vacation in Spain . My daughter Sasha, several long-time family friends, my personal staff and various guests had a wonderful time. Honestly, you just haven't lived until you have stayed in a $2,500.00 per night suite at a 5-Star luxury hotel. We only booked 70 rooms for our friends, staff and family. Thank you also for the use of Air Force 2 and the 70 Secret Service personnel who tagged along to be sure we were safe and cared for at all times.

 Air Force 2 only used 47,500 gallons of jet fuel for this trip and carbon emissions were a mere 1,031 tons of CO2. It costs only $11,500 per hour to operate Air Force 2 and each additional plane for the other members of our party group.  These are only rough estimates, but they are close (who's counting?). That's quite a carbon footprint as my good friend Al Gore would say, so we must ask the American citizens to drive smaller, more fuel efficient cars and drive less too, so we can lessen our combined carbon footprint.

I know times are hard and millions of you are struggling to put food on the table and trying to make ends meet. I do appreciate your sacrifice and do hope you find work soon. I was really exhausted after Barack took our family on a luxury vacation in Maine a few weeks ago. I just had to get away for a few days. Will write more from Martha's Vineyard where we will spend our sixth vacation this year with more of our family and friends.