Rick Moore said "This is What the Election is All About" (emphasis added):
From Virginia Democrat Representative Jim Moran:
"We have been guided by a Republican administration that believes in the simplistic notion that people who have wealth are entitled to keep it, and they have an antipathy towards the means of redistributing wealth."
Video here. In the socialist world of Moran and Obama, you are not entitled to keep your wealth.
Obama laughs off the charge of socialist behavior — and to be fair, socialism isn't the precise term to affix to his ideas. It's more like Robin Hood economics. On a recent campaign stop, Obama joked that, by the end of the week, McCain would be accusing him "of being a secret communist because I shared my toys in kindergarten."
A funny line. But, of course, Obama's lofty intellect must comprehend the fundamental difference between sharing your G.I. Joe with a friend and having a bully snatch your G.I. Joe for the collective, prepubescent good. It's the difference between coercion and free association and trade. In practical terms, it's the difference between government cheese and a meal at Ruth's Chris.
Now, I'm not suggesting Obama intends to transform this nation into 1950s-era Soviet tyranny or that he will possess the power to do so. I'm suggesting Obama is praising and mainstreaming an economic philosophy that has failed to produce a scintilla of fairness or prosperity anywhere on Earth. Ever.
Amen! Read the whole thing. Then vote as if our future depends on it.
It's not just residents of coal-producing states like Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, North Dakota, Montana, and Colorado who ought to be concerned about Barack Obama's threat to destroy the coal industry. His radical plan will, by his own admission, cause electricity prices across the country to "skyrocket." Are you ready for that? Is our economy ready?
Speaking to the San Francisco Chronicle on Jan. 17, Barack Obama singled out new coal plant construction for big taxes. The scheme, part of the cap-and-trade energy policy he wants to implement as president, is meant to tax coal producers straight out of business.
"So if somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can," Obama said. "It's just that it will bankrupt them because they're going to be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that's being emitted."
Isolated gaffe? No. On his own Web site, Obama declares:
"Once we make dirty energy expensive, the second step in my plan is to invest $150 billion over the next decade to ensure the development and deployment of clean, affordable energy."
In other words, Obama's plan is confiscatory taxes to first destroy America's domestic energy producers, and once that bridge is burned, force the U.S. to rely on alternative energies that haven't been developed. The big-government plan might make ideologues happy, but in the real world, it won't work. … …
America is the Saudi Arabia of coal, with the world's largest demonstrated reserve base of 489 billion short tons, the Energy Department says. About 93% of it is used to produce electricity, and it provides about half of U.S. electricity needs. As the nation's economy expands, that need for coal is projected to grow about 20% by 2030.
If that need can't be met, consumers will be hit with high prices brought on by shortages. Meanwhile, America's 80,000 miners and 1.6 million workers in coal-related and coal-dependent industries would suffer from Obama's taxes on new plants.
"Under my plan of a cap and trade system," Obama said in another interview, "electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket." He added that because "I'm capping greenhouse gases, coal power plants, you know, natural gas, you name it — whatever the plants were, whatever the industry was, they would have to retrofit their operations. That will cost money. They will pass that money on to the consumers."
The biggest problem with Obama's plan is that it taxes productive companies, and offers nothing but "hope" to replace the missing energy. He does not propose using our current resources as a bridge to cleaner energy. He'd rather stop their use cold. No nuclear power, no offshore drilling, no new coal plants, and if consumers have to pay more, too bad. Obama's attack on coal use surely will leave us poorer.
And that's only one of the hundreds of Obama plans to "fundamentally transform" this country that will make us all poorer. He's not going to redistribute wealth so much as he's going to redistribute misery. There will be lots more of that for everyone.
I didn’t say it, Senator Obama did. Speaking tonight at the University of Missouri in Columbia, Missouri, Senator Obama said, near the beginning of his speech: “We are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America.”
…
… fundamentally transforming something (in this case the United States of America) means to markedly change the nature, function, or condition of the foundation or base, forming or serving as an essential component of a system.
So what is it, exactly, that Senator Obama needs to markedly change? What is the foundation or base of the United States of America, the essential component of our system (our government)? I would argue it is the Constitution of the United States of America. But does the U.S. Constitution need to be markedly changed? I would argue, of course it does not. …
I'm a Libertarian and thus not exactly a fan of the status quo. But Obama crowing about "fundamentally transforming" America gives me a chill. When I factor in his 2001 interview in which he regretted that the Supreme Court has failed to "transform" the Constitution by embracing "positive rights" and income redistribution, I become very, very disturbed. This is dangerous stuff.
If you value the Constitution, if you value the founding (fundamental) principles of this country, if you value liberty — hold your nose and go vote for McCain.
Unless you're in a state where it clearly won't matter (like Massachusetts or New York). In that case, do me a favor and vote for Libertarian Bob Barr on my behalf. Regrettably, I can't. Colorado is close, and there's too much at stake.
HillBuzz has some sage advice for Republicans: Don't fall for the three head games the media and the Obama campaign are playing. And don't be an Eeyore:
The same pattern that unfolded during our primaries is happening again, because the media has just one tattered old used playbook (written by David Axelrod, of course), and they have not deviated from it yet. What the media and Obama campaign did, in concert, to Hillary Clinton before every major primary is what they are doing to McCain/Palin now. Here are the top three media/Obama head tricks to watch out for in the last days before the election.
If you, collectively, can keep Republicans and other McCain voters from falling for these, we believe there’s nothing Obama can do to win this election. The ONLY way McCain loses is if you Eeyores allow the media to keep you from the polls.
I was pleased to see that something I'd been thinking regarding one of those head games occurred to them, too. Head game #3 is "Repeated insistance that blacks and young people will decide this election, and they are all going to vote in record numbers for Obama." The unintended consequence of this game that occurred to both of us (great minds think alike) is that:
… the Obamedia’s constant drumbeat that Obama’s so far ahead will, ironically, keep a lot of these people from actually voting — since they think he will win in a landslide without them, and one vote doesn’t matter. “Oh, we meant to vote, but we got, like, busy. And stuff.”
According to a news report I heard last night, in the early voting, young people have (yet again) not turned out in the large numbers predicted by the pundits. So the outcome of this election may depend on this: Will the media trumpeting of an inevitable Obama victory keep more McCain supporters away from the long lines on election day or more Obama supporters?
HillBuzz summed up:
It’s all a head game, a fake out. All of this talk about Obama being ahead is just garbage the Obamedia shovels to make you give up and sit home so Obama can win. That’s what breeds Eeyores. And Eeyores giving up and staying home is why Hillary Clinton won Indiana by only 1% when she should have won it by 9%. It really is as simple as that.
So, heads up out there — if you can get Rush to talk about this stuff on air, it would do Republicans a world of good. Make as many people see the media for what they are — a paid extension of the Obama campaign — as humanly possible, keep your heads up, and let’s put another crack in the glass ceiling by making Sarah Palin the nation’s first female Vice President, while putting a good and decent man we trust behind the Resolute Desk where all of us Democrats know he’ll work effectively with Senator Clinton and other Democrats to fix our economy, create good jobs, and make America energy independent for good.
If we work hard, we will win.
Check out other recent posts at HillBuzz — they've been blogging up a storm. For instance, they say "Pennsylvania’s Democrats voting for McCain will decide this election," and think this flyer being widely distributed in Pennsylvania is significant. And there's this update — the Obama campaign has been charging the press thousands of dollars for backstage access (isn't it interesting that none of the national news organizations shaken down like this thought it was worth reporting). Now they're holding an illegal lottery offering a chance at similar access to contributors!
I've been so impressed by the work being done by HillBuzz that I donated $100. You can donate, too, right on the home page.
Last night, ABC's Nightline featured another attempt to smear Gov. Sarah Palin. But I think they made a strategic mistake. They interspersed their reports of purported anonymous McCain campaign insiders purportedly criticizing Palin for going "off the reservation" in recent appearances with actual footage of Palin speaking at those appearances.
I thought she was great in those clips and cheered what she said. I suspect I'm not the only one who had that reaction.
If the McCain-Palin campaign emerges victorious (which the less-rigged polls suggest is a real possibility), I think much of the credit belongs to Sarah Palin.
There is something odd — and dare I say novel — in American politics about the crowds that have been greeting Barack Obama on his campaign trail. Hitherto, crowds have not been a prominent feature of American politics. We associate them with the temper of Third World societies. We think of places like Argentina and Egypt and Iran, of multitudes brought together by their zeal for a Peron or a Nasser or a Khomeini. In these kinds of societies, the crowd comes forth to affirm its faith in a redeemer: a man who would set the world right.
As the late Nobel laureate Elias Canetti observes in his great book, "Crowds and Power" (first published in 1960), the crowd is based on an illusion of equality: Its quest is for that moment when "distinctions are thrown off and all become equal. It is for the sake of this blessed moment, when no one is greater or better than another, that people become a crowd." These crowds, in the tens of thousands, who have been turning out for the Democratic standard-bearer in St. Louis and Denver and Portland, are a measure of American distress.
On the face of it, there is nothing overwhelmingly stirring about Sen. Obama. There is a cerebral quality to him, and an air of detachment. He has eloquence, but within bounds. After nearly two years on the trail, the audience can pretty much anticipate and recite his lines. The political genius of the man is that he is a blank slate. The devotees can project onto him what they wish. The coalition that has propelled his quest — African-Americans and affluent white liberals — has no economic coherence. But for the moment, there is the illusion of a common undertaking — Canetti's feeling of equality within the crowd. …
The National Taxpayers Union Foundation (research arm of the National Taxpayers Union) compared the campaign platforms of the U.S. Senate candidates in Colorado, Nebraska, and New Mexico, and assessed the fiscal impact of their promises. In the Colorado race, Mark Udall's promises are far more expensive than Bob Schaffer's:
In preparing the study, NTUF reviewed the candidates' campaign Web sites and news reports to find any proposals that would impact the federal budget. Cost estimates come from a variety of independent sources, including Congressional Budget Office reports and data from NTUF's BillTally cost-accounting system, which since 1991 has computed a net annual agenda for each Member of Congress based on their sponsorship of bills. Among the findings:
Udall has offered 54 proposals that would affect federal spending – 25 of which would increase annual outlays, three of which would decrease expenditures, and 26 of which have unquantifiable fiscal effects — for a net annual spending hike of $55.3 billion.
Schaffer has offered 41 budget-related items — nine of which would boost annual federal spending, three of which would cut it, and 29 of which have costs that could not be calculated – for a net annual spending hike of $5.8 billion.
In fact, of the six candidates in the three states analyzed, Mark Udall is by far the biggest spender. The runner-up, at $25 billion, is New Mexico Democratic candidate Tom Udall. Maybe it's something in the DNA.
The most frugal of the six is New Mexico Republican candidate Steve Pearce, with a net increase of only $345 million.
I suspect that most of the estimates significantly understate the true cost. Many of the campaign promises have a fiscal impact judged "unquantifiable." I strongly suspect that "unquantifiable" is not "costless" — not by a long shot.
The analyses for all six (in PDF form) are linked on this summary page.
Speaking of media bias, would a major metropolitan newspaper withhold from the public material evidence regarding the character, beliefs, and associations of a presidential candidate? It's happening right now, according to Andrew McCarthy:
Let’s try a thought experiment. Say John McCain attended a party at which known racists and terror mongers were in attendance. Say testimonials were given, including a glowing one by McCain for the benefit of the guest of honor … who happened to be a top apologist for terrorists. Say McCain not only gave a speech but stood by, in tacit approval and solidarity, while other racists and terror mongers gave speeches that reeked of hatred for an American ally and rationalizations of terror attacks.
Now let’s say the Los Angeles Times obtained a videotape of the party.
Question: Is there any chance — any chance — the Times would not release the tape and publish front-page story after story about the gory details, with the usual accompanying chorus of sanctimony from the oped commentariat? Is there any chance, if the Times was the least bit reluctant about publishing (remember, we’re pretending here), that the rest of the mainstream media (y’know, the guys who drove Trent Lott out of his leadership position over a birthday-party toast) would not be screaming for the release of the tape?
Do we really have to ask?
So now, let’s leave thought experiments and return to reality: Why is the Los Angeles Times sitting on a videotape of the 2003 farewell bash in Chicago at which Barack Obama lavished praise on the guest of honor, Rashid Khalidi — former mouthpiece for master terrorist Yasser Arafat?
At the time Khalidi, a PLO adviser turned University of Chicago professor, was headed east to Columbia. There he would take over the University’s Middle East-studies program (which he has since maintained as a bubbling cauldron of anti-Semitism) and assume the professorship endowed in honor of Edward Sayyid, another notorious terror apologist.
The party featured encomiums by many of Khalidi’s allies, colleagues, and friends, including Barack Obama, then an Illinois state senator, and Bill Ayers, the terrorist turned education professor. It was sponsored by the Arab American Action Network (AAAN), which had been founded by Khalidi and his wife, Mona, formerly a top English translator for Arafat’s press agency.
Is there just a teeny-weenie chance that this was an evening of Israel-bashing Obama would find very difficult to explain? Could it be that the Times, a pillar of the Obamedia, is covering for its guy?
McCarthy excerpted at length from the "gentle story" about the event that the Times published in April and put that information into perspective. Read the whole thing.
Top technology writer Michael S. Malone is upset by what's happened to his profession:
The traditional media are playing a very, very dangerous game — with their readers, with the Constitution and with their own fates.
The sheer bias in the print and television coverage of this election campaign is not just bewildering, but appalling. And over the last few months I've found myself slowly moving from shaking my head at the obvious one-sided reporting, to actually shouting at the screen of my television and my laptop computer.
But worst of all, for the last couple weeks, I've begun — for the first time in my adult life — to be embarrassed to admit what I do for a living. A few days ago, when asked by a new acquaintance what I did for a living, I replied that I was "a writer," because I couldn't bring myself to admit to a stranger that I'm a journalist.
You need to understand how painful this is for me. I am one of those people who truly bleeds ink when I'm cut. I am a fourth-generation newspaperman. …
… I've spent 30 years in every part of journalism, from beat reporter to magazine editor. And my oldest son, following in the family business, so to speak, earned his first national byline before he earned his drivers license.
So, when I say I'm deeply ashamed right now to be called a "journalist," you can imagine just how deep that cuts into my soul. …
Republicans are justifiably foaming at the mouth over the sheer one-sidedness of the press coverage of the two candidates and their running mates. But in the last few days, even Democrats, who have been gloating over the pass — no, make that shameless support — they've gotten from the press, are starting to get uncomfortable as they realize that no one wins in the long run when we don't have a free and fair press.
Read the whole thing. There's much more, and Malone has an interesting theory on who's to blame and what motivates them.
In a 2001 Chicago public radio interview, then State Sen. Barack Obama said one of the failures of the civil rights movement was that it became court-focused, and the Supreme Court never addressed "the redistribution of wealth and the more basic issues of economic justice in this society." He called it a tragedy that the civil rights movement failed to put together "the actual coalitions of power through which you bring about redistributive change." And he regretted that the Constitution addresses only "negative liberties" — what the government can't do to you — and not "positive liberties" — what the government "must do on your behalf."
Here are key excerpts from the interview. Please share this with your non-socialist friends.
Contrary to what the Obama campaign and its mouthpieces in the mainstream media have been saying, Obama's "spread the wealth around" comment to Joe the Plumber hasn't been distorted, misrepresented, or overblown.
Obama really is a radical leftist, a socialist at heart, and someone who makes the George McGovern of 1972 sound like a moderate centrist.
Exactly what I'd expect from someone whose intellectual mentors, allies, friends, and colleagues include Saul Alinsky, Father Pfleger, the Rev. Wright, Bill Ayers, Bernadine Dohrn, Frank Marshall Davis, Alice Palmer, Rashid Khalidi, Raila Odinga …
As Ken Blackwell said recently about Obama's fraudulent promise of "tax cuts" that are really disguised income redistribution, "Having the government take money from business entities or affluent individuals and giving it to those who pay no federal income taxes is not Keynesian. It's Marxist."
With Colin Powell now repeating the lie that Barack Obama has "always been a Christian," despite new information further confirming Obama's Muslim childhood (such as the Indonesian school registration listing him as Muslim), one watches with dismay as the Democratic candidate manages to hide the truth on this issue.
Instead, then, let us review a related subject – Obama's connections and even indebtedness, throughout his career, to extremist Islam. Specifically, he has longstanding, if indirect ties to two institutions, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), listed by the U.S. government in 2007 as an unindicted co-conspirator in a Hamas-funding trial; and the Nation of Islam (NoI), condemned by the Anti-Defamation League for its "consistent record of racism and anti-Semitism."
Pipes goes on to cite a plethora of sources documenting Obama's ties to both Islamist organizations and the Nation of Islam specifically (read the whole thing). He then states (emphasis added):
That Obama's biography touches so frequently on such unsavory organizations as CAIR and the Nation of Islam should give pause. How many of politicians have a single tie to either group, much less seven of them? John McCain charitably calls Obama "a person you do not have to be scared [of] as president of the United States," but Obama's multiple links to anti-Americans and subversives mean he would fail the standard security clearance process for Federal employees.
In other words, the only way Barack Obama can get a job in the White House is by being elected to it, because he'd fail the background check if he applied for any job there.
It's infuriating that McCain, in his ongoing quest to campaign as "Mr. Nice Guy," dismissed the legitimate concerns many people have about Obama (and others would have if the McCain campaign gave them the facts). McCain's "charitable" statement stupidly insulated Obama from questions and criticisms that are entirely legitimate and that McCain himself ought to be raising. Is this fool not on his own side, or what?
I really wish I didn't have to vote for John McCain. But the alternative is so frightening and dangerous, I have no choice. So I'll hold my nose and do it. Please … you, too.
Bring in a McCain/Palin sign and Salvatore’s Pizzeria, in Warren, Michigan will exchange it for a free pizza.
It seems owner, Diana Franzoni, is miffed that the McCain campaign pulled its resources out of Michigan. She is quoted as saying, “Health care is killing us. McCain gave up on Michigan, so you should give up on him.”
FOX 2’s Brad Edwards explains how that offer may have prompted some hungry bargain hunters to break the law. He reports that Franzoni estimates that since she put the bounty on the signs, she is receiving about 30 pilfered signs a day for at least the last couple of weeks, which equals 100‘s of filched signs — and pizzas.
According to Newt Gingrich, a June Gallup Organization survey asked Americans if the government should focus on improving economic conditions or on "distributing wealth more evenly," and 84% chose the former. Thanks to Joe the Plumber, it should now be clear to everybody that Barack Obama is one of the 13% who chose the latter:
America met Joe the Plumber last week. But a pro-market economist writing over a hundred years ago was already familiar with Joe Wurzelbacher and Americans like him — and understood how they are used and exploited by politicians.
“They are always under the dominion of the superstition of government, and forgetting that a government produces nothing at all, they leave out of sight the first fact to be remembered in all social discussion — that the state cannot get a cent for any man without taking it from some other man, and this latter must be a man who has produced and saved it. This latter is the Forgotten Man.”
These are the words of William Graham Sumner, brilliantly analyzed and applied to 21st century America by Amity Schlaes in her recent book, The Forgotten Man.
Sumner wrote of the Forgotten Man: "He works, he votes, generally he prays — but he always pays — yes, above all, he pays."
Joe the Plumber has struck a chord in the closing weeks of this election because he represents the Forgotten Man. When he confronted Sen. Barack Obama on the campaign trail with the question of what would happen to his taxes under an Obama Administration should he realize his dream of owning his own business, Joe cast the decision that faces us in this election in stark relief:
Which will be better for our economy: Politicians redistributing our wealth or growing more wealth?
And Sen. Obama gave us an equally stark answer: Under his leadership, America will focus on “spreading around” the Forgotten Man’s wealth, not encouraging him to create more of it.
Our Country Deserves Better is conducting a cross-country bus tour, and tonight they stopped in Denver. I attended the rally. The audience was small — about 40 or so — but enthusiastic. I'm not surprised by the small turnout. For me, it was an easy light rail trip and a 1½ block walk. But if I were a suburban Denverite asked to drive there in my Lexus, I think I'd pass.
The location was Lincoln Park at 1144 Osage Street. That's the park and community recreation center just across the street from Denver's largest public housing project. There's a sign there announcing that the Denver Housing Authority is rehabilitating it. I'm guessing that, after years of government efforts to "disperse" public housing "clients," the ones remaining in these rabbit warrens are those deemed least likely to be successfully integrated into other communities.
So how did this rally end up there? I suspect that someone from the organization's headquarters (in California, I think) called the appropriate office in Denver government for a permit (Parks and Recreation Dept., maybe?). They explained that they wanted a permit for a "Stop Obama" rally, and the Denver bureaucrat handling the call said, "I've got just the place for you." I bet they had quite a laugh in that office afterward.
Given the location and its demographics, it was ironic that the only minority at the rally was tour member Lloyd Marcus. He was great. He's a damn fine singer and a pretty decent songwriter. And he's the president of the NAACPC — the National Association for the Advancement of Conservative People of Color. He performed some fine songs, including his Palin version of Sarah Smile (YouTube version below).
The moment that touched me was when Lloyd Marcus said, with his eyes glistening, "Don't let them tell you if you vote against Obama you're a racist!"
Choked me up. I shook his hand and thanked him for his courage. And then I donated the two twenties in my wallet to the cause. Best wishes to you, Lloyd Marcus!
UPDATE: I have a few pix on my camera, but (as usual) still haven't downloaded them. Never mind, there's a great photo essay (along with text) of the Pueblo, CO, event here.
