The effort to re-write recent history

It is my contention that the education system that is in place in today’s public schools no longer teaches people how to think. Rather, they teach people what to think. The schools want to teach their own revised version of history instead of allowing people to find out for themselves the events that actually did happen.

Case in point is a letter-to-the-editor in today’s edition of the Patriot News. The paper contains a letter from some uninformed idiot concerning his view of how history has unfolded over the last 16 years. First, he claims that the Republicans squandered the Clinton budget surpluses of the late 90’s. If this dolt knew anything about history, he would know that it was not until 1994 and the Contract with America that these surpluses started to become a reality. Clinton did not want the budget that the Republicans passed. However, he did not have a choice. He signed it, the economy flourished, the Republican-controlled Congress actually controlled spending, and there were surpluses. Yet, Clinton takes the credit for something he did not really want and was basically forced to sign.

Next, this guy blames the federal budget deficit on Republicans, as if no Democrats helped out. After several years of being in control of Congress, many Republicans let the power go to their heads and started to govern like Democrats. They earmarked budget bills beyond comprehension. They did not look to control government spending. They sought out every chance to befriend Democrat ideas instead of standing up for conservative principles. Gov. Bobby Jindal was right when he said that the Republicans lost their way. They forgot the core principles that got them elected in the first place.

Then there was 9/11. While it may not be politically correct to point this out, that did change this country. It put an emphasis on defense and intelligence, which are 2 budget areas that had been decreased significantly over the years leading up to 2001. That was a time of pain for the airline industry. In fact, it hurt many areas of our immense industrial complex for quite some time.

When Congress passed a tax cut measure and President Bush signed it, a time of economic prosperity then followed. For the next several years, the economy flourished. In fact, even with lower tax rates, the revenues flowing into the federal treasury actually increased. But how can this be? It is due to the fact that people were able to keep more of their money and spend it as they saw fit. This spending allowed employers to hire more people given the higher consumer demand. Companies prospered and were able to pay their employees more. It was Reagan’s trickle-down economics at its finest.

However, the Republican leaders in Congress saw this influx of money to the treasury and couldn’t control themselves. They just had to go out and spend it. And the Democrats want to blame all of the deficit issues on the Republicans. Well, they did nothing to stop the spending. In fact, they helped out even more. They did not want to cut any federal program. They wanted to continue the spending orgy.

All of these excesses, combined with scandals but some top-tier Republicans, led to them being removed from power. Keep in mind, they were ousted mainly by Republicans, whether it was in a primary loss or Republicans not voting for them in general elections. We knew that the Democrats did the same things. They were just able to hide their corruption, with the willing help of many in the media.

Now, the few conservative Republicans in Congress are now speaking up and saying that we need to stop this spending spree. These conservatives were always there, they were just shut out of the process. It is amazing, though, that everyone says conservatives should lighten up and move to the middle in order to remain relevant. However, it is those moderates that are no longer serving in Congress. The conservatives are still there. So, to the chagrin of many, maybe it is the conservatives that are indeed the core of the Republican Party.

Democrats are now in power in Congress. They blame the Republicans for the budget deficit (and to a large degree, this is justified criticism). However, they should know that deficit spending is not a good thing. It does not work. If it was wrong for Republicans to ring up deficits year after year, how can they then justify ringing up much larger deficits in order to get us back on the right track? It makes no sense. Besides, government will not look to decrease spending in the future. Once they start the spending, they are not able or willing to decrease spending in the future.

This brings us full circle. How do people buy into this idea of larger deficits in the short-term (and they will continue into the future with the unrestrained spending we now face) being good for the economy? Are people this blind to what is going on? It is because they are being told what to think, not taught how to think.

Defeating Arlen Specter, Part II

Arlen Specter is now on a save-my-face tour, defending his vote for the President's stimulus bill. I am astounded at his patent disregard for the people that voted for him. As conservatives, we knew we could not consistently rely on a good vote from him, but he did come through occasionally.

Many in the Republican Party are ready to throw this turncoat overboard. No longer does he stand for the things that made the Republican Party great. He wants bigger government, greater government intervention in all aspects of our life, the right to an abortion, and to be the new maverick of the U.S. Senate. He wants to be the center of attention.

On Monday, Specter will be at the White House, meeting with the President and members of the Cabinet. According to Specter, "...it's very good for Pennsylvania that I have a seat at the table. No doubt, I consider each issue on its own merits. I don't trade votes. And if you're willing to think about things, if you have no commitment to ideology, you're in demand. People want to talk to you....I have a seat at the table. It's a hot seat." (note: emphasis added by me)

While I have nothing against meeting with the President or members of the other party, to do so in order to identify more closely with them and to compromise your own personal beliefs in order to win their affection is wrong. And while I might agree that it is good to take each issue on its own merits and not trade votes, the fact that he has no commitment to ideology is difficult to comprehend. Basically, what he is saying to me is that he does not really believe in anything. He will do whatever is politically expedient for his own benefit. Forget making decisions based on what is right and wrong, it is all a matter of what it will take to be re-elected.

Arlen Specter is not placing his votes in the Senate with the best-interests of the people of Pennsylvania in mind. He is voting based on political expediency. That is not what we need. We need someone who cares about the people of Pennsylvania, that will vote the way the people of Pennsylvania want him to vote.

If Specter is defeated in the primary, Republicans and conservatives may lose the Senate seat to a Democrat. After all, Republicans are outnumbered by Democrats to the tune of about 1.2 million people in PA. However, we will not really have lost anything since we have had a wannabe Democrat in the Senate for over 20 years. I will actively continue to help any Republican defeat this man.

Defeat Arlen Specter in 2010

Arlen Specter is the senior Senator from the state of Pennsylvania. He came to have that seat due to the untimely death of Sen. John Heinz in an airplane crash back in the 80's. Before that, we was a Congressman from the Philadelphia area.

Sen. Specter labels himself as a Republican. However, in practice, he is far from it. If you look up RINO in the dictionary, you will probably find his photo. He is pro-abortion. He was an opponent of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. Anything that is conservative is everything that he is against.

The final straw for me was his backing of the President's stimulus package last week. He was one of the 3 Republicrat senators who helped to craft a 'compromise' bill. It did not matter to him how many of his constituents were against the bill (and we contacted him to let him know this). It did not matter to him that this is a bad bill and a bad idea. He was looking out for himself and what he thought he needed to do to be re-elected come November 2010.

Several months ago, it was rumored that Chris Matthews, the clown that hosts MSNBC's Hardball, would run against him for his Senate seat. However, Matthews chose not to do this. I think he knew he did not stand a chance, given Specter's liberal credentials.

In 2004, Specter was running for re-election. At that time, President Bush and Sen. Santorum (PA's junior Senator at the time) both stuck out their necks and supported him for re-election to the Senate, and he won. But at what cost? President Bush was not even sworn in for his second term when Senator Specter started taking shots at him. When Sen. Santorum ran for re-election in 2006, Specter did not support him with the same veracity that Santorum showed to Specter.

He continues to sell out the Republican Party (specifically, conservatives), as well as the people of Pennsylvania. Well, enough is enough. It is time for the Senator to be defeated by a conservative who has the best interests of the people of PA as his/her foremost priority. I do not care about bi-partisanship. I care about doing what is right. Should it happens that doing what is right is not politically correct or expedient, I do not care. I want someone who chooses to do what is right over what is expedient.

It is my hope and prayer that Pennsylvania has a good conservative candidate to run against Arlen Specter. In the coming months, we shall see who comes to the forefront of this race. I know that my energy will be spent trying to defeat our current Senator.

More thoughts on the so-called economic stimulus package

Well, it looks like a few RINOs have caved in and made a deal with the Democrats in the Senate. They have reduced the $827 billion stimulus plan to $780 billion, a whopping $47 billion decrease for those of you who are not very good at simple subtraction.

This so-called compromise was reached last night. If this is not annoying enough, Senate Majority Leader (and the most partisan, hateful, spiteful, mean, bitter, ornery man in the Senate) Harry Reid wanted to bring it up for a vote last night, before anyone had a chance to look through it and scrutinize the spending. He says it is too important to wait. I am going to paraphrase the quote I heard on the news today, "We can tell who the people are that want to get work done around here."

Excuse me!?!?!? Is it wrong to want to read and review a bill that is going to cost the taxpayers (yes, it will cost us - it is not free) at least $ 780,000,000,000 (it will probably cost much more)? I don't think so. It would be irresponsible not to look at it.

He does not want people to read it for fear that we will find out what spending they want to attach to it. They want to fund all of their pet projects and basically buy votes in order to maintain their power base. This is sad and pathetic. It is immoral. In fact, it is almost criminal.

Many people are starting to see that government spending will not get us out of economic trouble. It will only dig us deeper. The public is generally against more government spending (as can be seen in recent polls), especially in the form of this so-called stimulus. So why are these poll-driven, self-serving, so-called public servants seeking to pass this bill anyway? It is very early in this congressional term, and they hope people forget it before the elections. They want it to be said of them that they did something about it. In their eyes, it is better to do something, even though it will be a colossal failure, than it would be to do nothing at all.

The same people that complained about excessive budget deficits during the Bush years are no where to be found now. Why? Because the deficit never really mattered to them in the first place. They only care about power and maintaining that power.

They do not want more tax cuts because they know tax cuts work. They worked in the 80's under Reagan and they worked in the early parts of this decade under Bush. Tax rates were decreased and revenue to the treasury increased. Tax cuts actually brought more money into the treasury because people had more money to spend, businesses had more money to spend, so more people were employed. People made more money. The government was not standing in the way of prosperity (at least, not as much as they are now).

When you have a chance, read the book Animal Farm by George Orwell. The Democrats are equivalent to the pigs. They ran the farmers out of town because the farmers were abusing the animals. The pigs took control of the farm and became the leaders. The people who support the Democrats are like the horse. They see the rules changing (there is never a massive change at any one time, only little changes). Over time, these changes became diametrically opposed to the original intent of the rules. However, over time, the pigs became just like the farmers that they ran out of town. It is sad to say that Orwell's thesis is coming true in today's society.

The Democrats do not want the electorate to have more power. Rather, they want us to dependent on government to get us out of this. They want us to be reliant on government in all aspects of our life, as that will keep them in power. This is not what the founding fathers intended. And we should not allow it.

Call your representatives and senators and let them know that you are against. Demand that they vote against this. Let them know we do not want socialism in this country. It has not worked anywhere else, and we want no part of it. Do not accept an answer from them that they are going to vote for this. They work for you.

Economic Ignorance of our President

President Obama was speaking to the sycophantic Democrats that we call our Congressman and Senators (and the media) last night. News clips show him being full of angst at the slow path his economic recovery plan is taking through the U.S. Senate. He wants this bill to be passed swiftly and put into operation as soon as possible.

He showed faux outrage at the deficit, blaming it all in his predecessor. President Bush may not have been as fiscally responsible as I would have preferred him to be, but the budget deficit and the resulting national debt can be put squarely at the feet of Congress. It is this branch of the legislature that spends the government's money. It is not the President that pays the bills. Try to find a government program to cut or throw out completely. It is impossible. The Democrats will not allow it. This is the reason we run up deficits. So why were these Democrats cheering at the President's statements about inheriting a huge debt? These same people were responsible for that debt. Also, how can we do this thing debt free? If we are trillions in debt, how can we throw another trillion in the mix and not come out with more debt?

He criticizes his critics for calling this a spending bill. He says that a stimulus is spending. The problem is that a growth stimulus should allow for growth. This bill is only about government spending. It only creates government jobs, not free market jobs. It grows government. Therefore, it is a spending bill. It is not stimulating anything but Congressmen who see the pork barrel rolling towards their district.

He blames the prior administration for the economic woes. The last time I checked, we had 5 years of unprecedented prosperity under President Bush. His tax cuts lifted this economy after the 9/11 attacks. It was not government spending on social programs that lifted us economically. Rather, it was allowing people to keep their hard earned money and spending it they way they wanted to spend it. It did not come from more government programs and government spending (except for an increase in national defense spending).

Economic problems came along because banks were lending money to people who had no business getting money, they were extending credit to people who did not deserve it. Why did they do this? Because of Congress. The banks were basically forced to do this. This is what caused problems. It was government intervention into industry that caused the problem.

Why does this need to be approved now? Why does the President not want people to question this bill? It is because he does not want people to see what is in the bill. Then they will really be against it. If they can get it through quickly, then they can keep a lot of the earmarks out the news. Isn't it funny how debate and disagreement with the President were a good thing when Bush was in office, but it is now sacrilegious now that Obama is President?

One more thing: Where is the bipartisanship? I thought this President was going to take unprecedented steps to reach out. It did not sound that way last week. He sounded like a man who thought it was his God-given right to have everyone agree with him. He is the only one who can be right. he could get this passed without any Republicans voting for it. His problem is that people in his own party will not even vote for this. That's pretty bad.

So I say to the President: Grow Up and Act Presidential! Your predecessor never acted like this in 8 years, and it only took you 2 weeks. You are nothing but a Chicago thug, a politician who cannot get his way on the merits of his argument so he needs to try to bully others into agreeing with you. You say you were going to listen to opposing views (granted, you never said you would compromise, but you would at least listen). Now, you are taking absolutely no time to do that now. It must be your way and it must be now.

Our most colossal failures generally come when we act quickly and do not think about what we are doing. Our economic downfall as a country will not be failing to pass a stimulus package. Rather, it will come by being reckless and passing something so big we cannot get out from under it. Maybe the best course of action is for the government to do nothing and allow this current economic 'crisis' to fix itself. It has worked in the past. It will work now.

Who is using the politics of fear now?

President Obama has an op-ed piece in today's Washington Post. He is looking to garner support for his economic stimulus bill. He looks for support by attempting to frighten the reader into supporting his economic plan. He says that every day that we fail to pass a stimulus plan, more people will lose their jobs, lose their savings, lose their homes, etc. (sounds like a country music song).

Anyway, he states that "...this recession might linger for years. Our economy will lose 5 million more jobs. Unemployment will approach double digits. Our nation will sink deeper into a crisis that, at some point, we may not be able to reverse." He also rejected the thought that additional tax cuts are needed, saying that he rejects "those theories, and so did the American people when they went to the polls in November and voted resoundingly for change."

The first thing that troubles me is that he has no faith in the people of this country. Ronald Reagan had faith in the people of America when he came into office, and the economic times then were worse than they are now. Guess what? We dug out of a recession. It did not take new government programs and close to a trillion dollars in government spending to do so. It took a tax rate cut. It took de-regulation. It took the government removing the obstacles that stood in front of Americans. When the obstacles were not there, Americans could prosper. It is the freedom we had as people that made this country great. It is not the country that made its people great.

Second, he is overestimating his mandate as President. Yes, he did receive a majority of the votes cast on November 4th. Nothing I say or do will change that. People voted for this mystical idea of change that President Obama talked about. They thought he would make things different, make them better. However, what we are seeing now is not the change that people were searching for. People do not see the economy getting better simply because we have a new President. Just because people voted for change does not mean they want Obama's kind of change. This is what happens when people do not stop to kick the tires on something before they buy into it. It may look good on the outside, but it is not what they wanted on the inside.

Third, why does he think reliance on the government and/or government control of everything is a good thing? If he would have studied history, he would see that this has not worked throughout history. It is not working now. Also, people are seeing that government control is not necessarily a good thing. It gives away freedoms that we cherish. After all, the liberals did complain a lot over the Terrorist Surveillance Program while Bush was President. Obama's policies will interfere in everyone's lives, not just the lives of terrorists, so there is much more danger with his policies.

Fourth, he does not know how to deal with the fact that his views are unpopular. This has not happened to him before. Everyone is supposed to accept his views, his policies, his opinions without question. When all else fails, blame Rush Limbaugh, Fox News, and talk radio. it can't be his fault.

Fifth, his stimulus plan is nothing more than a pork-laden spending bill. It will do nothing to stimulate job growth. People are seeing this now. Too bad they did not see if before November 4th.

Here is the problem: We, as a country, got what we wanted in the form of a new President who wanted change. However, these same people who voted for him did not realize the ramifications of his policies at the time they voted for him. They are starting to see it now. Now that we got what we wanted, we could very well lose what we had.