An Obama Promise...

Written : Oct. 27, 2009

Among other things, candidate Barack Obama repeatedly promised the following while campaigning in 2008, about his future “open” administration: He was going to have all the [health care] negotiations around a big table. He suggested the participants would include doctors and nurses and hospital administrators, insurance companies, drug companies. They'd get a seat at the table…they just wouldn’t be able to buy every chair… The negotiations were promised to have been televised on C-SPAN so that people could see who’d be making arguments on behalf of their constituents and who’d be making arguments on behalf of the drug companies or the insurance companies.

Obama suggested bipartisanship and transparency. He told us, “Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency.” Many now wonder who, beside his union and media supporters, believes him anymore.

The truth is, the Democrats have created their bills behind closed doors, without any conservative Republican input. The only attempt at bipartisanship has been a demand that the Republicans buy into the Democrats’ plan. That’s not bipartisanship at all. It’s the beginning of a dictatorship. When the American people expressed their displeasure at such secrecy at “town halls” and “tea parties”, the Obama administration dismissed them by among other things suggesting that evil Fox News put all the “crazies” up to it! Mainstream media Obama-supporter reporters openly still call citizens’ opinions “noise”. Kiran Chetry dismissed ordinary Americans on CNN when comparing those at town halls to members of organized political groups singing about the virtues of the public health care option this week. The following didn’t make into the official CNN transcript, but I definitely heard Chetry say, “Now isn’t that better than all that noise?”, referring to the people who attended the town halls.

Just for fun, I remind you of some of the other campaign promises: Promising health care as good as the senators have – for everyone. “We will work to lower your premiums by $2,500 per family…And we’ll do it by the end of my first term,” he said. He promised to not raise taxes on anyone making less than $250,000, then $200,000, then $ per year. Remember that?

To see more campaign promises from the current U.S. President cut + paste the following URL into your browser: http://www.votegopher.com/obamaIssues.php

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Obama’s Prize

Written : Oct. 13, 2009

Just a mention of the Nobel Peace Prize used to give me a feeling one could achieve anything if given a chance. Of course, like a lot of young people years ago, I confused “Nobel” with the English word “noble”. The prize is actually named for Alfred Nobel, a Swedish entrepreneur, who lived his entire life in the nineteenth century (1833-1896). You might be surprised to learn (as I was) that Nobel experimented with explosives like nitroglycerine, is credited for inventing dynamite, blasting caps, and various blasting powders, started his own explosives company, and as a result became quite wealthy. Nobel, the businessman, knew several peace activists in his life and specified in his final will that a peace prize be given to people or groups promoting peace.

Many previous recipients of the Nobel Peace Prize received the award out of something they did to further peace in the world. The current U.S. president, Barack Obama, was awarded the prize after only nine months in office – with no tangible measure of success for peace, at least not yet. According to the Nobel Committee’s rules one must be nominated by Feb. 1 of the current year in order to become eligible. In President Obama’s case, this would have been just after spending twelve days in office!

The questions requiring answers are, “Does Obama deserve the Nobel Peace Prize?”, and, “Was the award given for political reasons?” For example, if the Nobel Committee were comprised of mostly liberals, was it possible they awarded the prize to Obama because they agree with his politics or policies? If so, was such action fair, or was it politically biased? Should the award only be given to liberals?

What is peace, anyway? Is it kindness? Is it the absence of war? Is it the absence of conflict of any kind? Is it the feeling of “peace of mind” one gets when one is completely protected? Is “peace” provided when someone else (or another country) will not attack you out of fear of reprisal? On Hannity, on Oct. 12, 2009, Mark Steyn said that if you define peace as the absence of American power on the world stage, then Obama definitely deserves the prize.

I used to respect the Nobel Peace Prize and its committee, but I respect them no longer. If the prize was used to take a stab at George W. Bush and /or his policies, which protected the U.S. and its citizens, then the prize is a joke. At the very least the committee should have waited until Obama had actually accomplished something peaceful in order to award the prize to him. If the committee had done it that way instead, it would have been much more respectable. Donna Brazile, a liberal commentator, was in favor of Obama being awarded the prize. Of this, her comment on “This Week” on Oct. 11, was, “Now [that he got the Nobel Peace Prize], he has to earn it!” But, doesn’t that go against the idea of a prize? First you earn it, and then after you earn it, you may be recognized for your action!

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Where Do We Go From Here?

Written : Oct. 06, 2009

Former Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) gave what turned out to be a motivational speech on Oct 1, 2009 which he called, “Jumpstarting America’s Economy by Putting People First.” It was part of the American Future Fund's 2009 Conservative Lecture Series. It was televised on CSPAN on Oct. 5. You can view it at: Santorum Speech A speech on TV hasn’t made me feel this good in a long time!

Sen. Santorum pointed out that Republicans shouldn’t “believe in business” as such. Instead, we should believe in people and markets. If markets are allowed to flourish while being modestly regulated, businesses will succeed, he reasoned. “We have to believe that people can… and markets do (work)”. This is a common sense approach, which stabs at the stereotype that conservatives love business to the exclusion of all else. It’s a falsehood some want to perpetuate for political reasons.

This is partly what’s wrong with the GOP’s lost direction these days, and Santorum addressed it with finesse while hitting the nail on the head. I agree. As members of the Republican Party we need to analyze issues like this in detail and choose how to proceed. This is in no way a cover-up, but in many ways this is a struggle with semantics.

Sen. Santorum’s right, we need to do a better job of telling the people who we are. We believe in America’s can-do attitude. We believe in the middle-class work ethic. It doesn’t matter who you are and your heritage makes no difference to us. Be persistent. Don’t let the little things get you down. Work hard, stay in school, do your best, work well with others, learn, and excel at what you do and you can achieve anything in America. It does work. You can achieve great things if you try hard enough. There’s plenty of success around – enough for ALL of us! Who can argue with that? If you consider yourself a moderate or even a liberal who believes in the individual and is dissatisfied with the way things are going, seriously consider us, we may be just what you were looking for all along, but didn’t know it. We welcome you with open arms!

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Investigative Reporting

Written : Sep. 21 and 23, 2009

Remember Watergate? Investigative reporters were hailed for bringing down a U.S. president. A movie, “All the President’s Men”, was made to celebrate their persistent and diligent search for the truth. Remember the TV show “60 Minutes”, and how their reporters grilled rip-off artists and corrupt politicians in an attempt to be an American watchdog? I recall a “Saturday Night Live” spoof starring Martin Short portraying a nervous, cigarette-smoking target. He stated/asked while visibly shaking, “It’s not me, it’s them, right?” Hilarious, great stuff.

Things are different today. Have you heard of ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now)? ACORN is an organization on schedule to receive 8.5 billion dollars of stimulus funds, and it defines itself a “grassroots community organization of low- and moderate-income people… committed to social and economic justice”. To be fair, check out their own page: ACORN Of course, ACORN has a right to exist and to aim for change it deems necessary; it’s the American way.

At the same time, ACORN is an organization in deep trouble. Accusations arose in 2008 from ACORN’s alleged registration of people not eligible to vote. They have been accused of falsifying documents, and registering underage and deceased voters. In addition, I’ve seen a story claiming that they used all the names of the Dallas Cowboys football team to register voters illegally. Even I, an ordinary citizen, know from personal experience that some people think it’s legitimate to stop at nothing to elect candidates they believe in. That’s just plain wrong.

Some may not know that recently several of ACORN’s offices were visited by two young, investigative reporters, James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles (remember the bold Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, the ones who uncovered Watergate?). Today’s truth digging reporters exposed ACORN employees who encouraged illegal activities (prostitution) and offered suggestions for the reporters, who were posing as a pimp and a prostitute, to evade taxes and the law. These bold, young reporters released videotapes to prove their allegations are true. To learn more, see: ACORN exposed. ACORN’s leaders eventually fired the employees in question. Their CEO, Bertha Lewis, has ordered an independent investigation into the story. Ignoring President Obama’s many ties to ACORN for the moment, shouldn’t the government suspend all funds going to ACORN and shouldn’t the government itself investigate the group in a rigorous manner for the purpose of reducing fraud?

In addition, where’s the “60 Minutes” report? Why is the mainstream media so relaxed about this particular investigative story? If the national media are so concerned about law breaking and corruption in businesses, shouldn’t they be jumping on this story and publicizing it, as they did for the Watergate investigation? Shouldn’t your local newspaper or local TV station be exposing the truth about ACORN on their front page and as their top story? Why have you not heard more about this?

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Rep. Joe Wilson’s Apology

Written : Sep. 15, 2009

In case you haven’t heard about this yet, Representative Joe Wilson (R-SC) shouted “You Lie” during President Obama’s speech to both branches of Congress last week. He was wrong to do so and privately apologized to the president sometime afterward. The apology was graciously accepted. After the apology the president reportedly said, “Now, let’s move on.”

The Democratic Congress was not done, however. After all, Joe Wilson gave the Democrats something to rail against. Therefore, they jumped on the chance to punish Wilson. They did so by censuring him. The measure involves a vote by the governing body for a resolution showing displeasure toward the politician. The House of Representatives voted 240-179, passing it.

You know, there’s video which was shot during President Bush’s speeches to Congress showing the opposition (the Democrats) rudely booing, moaning, and shouting. No video has emerged revealing anyone calling him a liar during the speeches, at least not yet. There’s video of members of Congress stating that President Bush was a liar. Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid outwardly showed anger toward him while speaking about his plan to rescue Social Security. Did any of them ever apologize? There was a movie made and people were urged to assassinate President Bush but was anyone called out for it in the mainstream media? No. It was awful, shameful, disgusting, embarrassing, boorish, immature, hateful, etc. - you have to admit it - what the media and many celebrities did to our last president.

However, all of the Democrats’ nastiness doesn’t excuse Joe Wilson. No one should boo or shout down a President of the United States – ever. No citizen should. No representative should. It’s bad behavior, it’s against the rules, and it’s inappropriate. Sure Wilson made a mistake. I disagree with most of Obama’s policies. I support the Tea Parties and the rallies against the current health care bill. But, Rep. Wilson interrupted a president’s speech inside the walls of Congress. He apologized to the president, but didn’t he owe an apology to the Congress as well? It wouldn’t have hurt to apologize to the Congress as well as to President Obama.

At the same time I wonder, would the Democrats have been as fair and as respectful to President Bush and/or a Republican Congress? Somehow, I doubt it. Take a gander at this, an article from the NY Daily News online by Albor Ruiz: Yet another biased, hateful article in the mainstream media

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Conservatives OK with Content of Obama Speech to Kids

Written : Sep. 8, 2009

A long time ago a young Democrat who happened to be the President of the United States urged the American people to, “Ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country.” It was part of the kind spirit and greatness of John Fitzgerald Kennedy to ask Americans to help America in a unique way.

The other day the current president announced he had an address prepared for the school children of this country. Great. JFK and other presidents did it. However, many parents believed the Obama Administration would make this a partisan speech. Why did they think such a possibility existed? The contents of the lesson plan, which was sent to the schools ahead of time, suggested it. The lesson plan asked the teachers to suggest the children write something (to themselves) describing what they could do to help the president! Help the president? What happened to “help America?” Such an idea to help the president stands in stark contrast to what John F. Kennedy said at his inaugural.

Conservatives are ok with the content of Obama’s speech to the school kids. Really. What ticked off many was the over-zealous lesson plan. Excuse some of us for thinking, but the lesson plan’s objective made many ask, “Help the president? Help him with his agenda? Help him ‘spread the word’ about how great his Congress’ Health Care Reform package could be? Help him by reporting those who don’t agree with him to the special web site he setup for such insanity?” You tell me, could asking the children how they would have helped him have been perceived as a partisan tactic, or not? What if President Bush had done the same thing? In that situation could liberals have guessed he would have been asking them to support his policies?

The icing on the cake was the way Thomas Friedman, author and NY Times correspondent, went nuts over the parents’ and others’ objections over the speech on the Sep. 7, 2009 edition of “Meet the Press”. He repeated over and over in a loud voice and angry demeanor, “It’s flat out stupid!” Of course he was telling us that thinking carefully about the matter is stupid. He and other liberals believe people are against the president because they are against the man himself. My local TV station repeated such an opinion at least twice this morning. Such a take is misguided, as is the racist angle, and the ridiculous argument that conservatives will never support him. We are just astounded how partisan the lesson plan sounded. Remember, our elected officials work for us, and not vice-versa. Asking the children to think about how they might help him is ludicrous. In fact, “It’s flat out stupid!”

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Conservative Blog

Health Care Plan (HR3200) Made Simple

Written : Sep. 1, 2009

It's a Government Run Program - and they never work properly -

- for instance, Social Security, Medicare, the Post Office, etc.

- and which seeks to save lots of money

- saves money one way by cutting Medicare re-imbursements

+ adds end-of-life counseling for old people

- reimburses Doctors for said counseling

= causes choices which favor only “efficient” operations with high success rates

= which is rationed care and goes against the Hippocratic oath and

= old people are encouraged to take meds and cross their fingers instead of getting life-saving procedures.

also = a change in values in America favoring death over life = scary!

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