A Hard Left and Into The Ditch

Cluster26 Comments

“The era of big government is over” – Bill Clinton, 1996.

That may be the last sensible thing any elected Democrat ever said. Of course that was a time when sensible Democrats like Evan Bayh, Sam Nunn, and Joe Lieberman were amongst the ranks but those days are gone. Beginning with the election, or as Democrats are fond of saying, the “selection”, of George W Bush the Democrats have been veering left. There was a brief moment in 2001 when the attack on our homeland caused the parties to set aside their differences and focus instead on the growing dangers of the outside world. In fact some of the most impassioned arguments for the Iraq war on the Senate floor came from Democrats Hillary Clinton and Jay Rockefeller. But that unity and that passion would be short lived. As soon as the war became difficult and many Americans became frustrated, the Democrats seized the opportunity and began polarizing the country for political expediency, and that polarization is even more pronounced today.

Over the last decade, the Democratic Party has used every issue possible to divide this country along every societal line; age, race, sex, income, etc. The Democrats have also used every single procedural weapon to push through partisan legislation to the extent of lying on the Senate floor, lying to the American people, and creating and employing the fourth “regulatory” branch of government when Congress opposed them. The Democratic Party has moved so far left over the last decade that their ranks are thinning and their constituencies are dwindling. It’s more than a little embarrassing that the current field of Democrat POTUS candidates are all older, white career politicians, and outside of Julian Castro and Cory Booker, their bench is very weak. By comparison, the GOP is flush with young, talented people including the current field of POTUS candidates but also including folks like Susanna Martinez, Mia Love, Paul Ryan, Raul Labrador, and Trey Gowdy. The Democrats can’t even come close to matching this abundance of young talent. But what is even more perilous for the Democrats is their shrinking base. Their pandering over the last several years has emboldened a few of the more vocal minorities, which is now causing problems for them by continually having to serve more and more of their extreme demands. Just in the last couple of years the Democrats have angered the unions, a bedrock constituency, by appeasing the environmentalists and not approving the Keystone Pipeline. Also, via the fourth branch of government, manufacturing and mining jobs are disappearing and as a consequence so are even more union jobs. I also think that the #blacklivesmatters movement, which is literally taking over the Democratic podium this campaign season, has deeper roots than many want to admit. I think the movement has more to do with the sad plight many black families find themselves in largely as a result of government policies over the last 50 years. Policies of which they have been voting for, and of which were promised to “help” them. These policies have failed them and their community and I think their frustration is being misread to be an anti cop movement, which again is angering the unions. And now, on top of the many failed social and economic justice programs is the open border policies and legalization efforts the Democrats are pushing, which will only serve to flood the already crowded low skilled labor market and drive wages down. Black youth unemployment is over 50% and that will only get worse until we bring new solutions to the table and stop the progressive Democrats from “helping”.

The Democrats have painted themselves into a corner by their zeal for power and control and their incessant pandering to the smallest of grievances over the last several years. According to Real Clear Politics, 63% of Americans believe the country is headed in the wrong direction, and I highly doubt that that those people are hoping this country would be even more polarized and regulated. I think the most obvious example of how far left the Democrats have gone is the fact that the rival candidate to the Democrat front runner is an admitted socialist and not even a member of the party. From abortion, to immigration, to foreign policy, tt is time to define the Democrats positions just as they are, tenuous and extreme.

Out and About on a Wednesday

Mark Noonan11 Comments

It appears that the Iran deal will allow Iran to inspect itself to determine if Iran is keeping its end of the bargain. As I said, the Iran deal wasn’t to prevent Iran from getting nukes – the Iran deal was to remove sanctions from Iran so that Iran can become our “partner” in the Middle East. Partner in what remains to be seen.

So, the Boycott Divest Sanction (BDS) movement wanted to a get a singer scheduled for a Spanish music fest to come out in favor of the BDS position. Singer refused. Singer was disinvited to perform. Usual bit of Progressive fascism for the most part – but the key to this one is that the singer in question was the only person asked to make the pro-BDS statement…and the singer is Jewish-American. In other words, the Jew was singled out for Special Handling. Anyone want to claim the left isn’t increasingly anti-Semitic? In the end, the disgusting nature of this forced the music fest to back down, apologize and re-invite the singer…but how many less famous Jews are getting ground up in this sort of thing? And how many of our Progressives even remotely realize that they are backing people who would massacre every Jew in Israel, if given the chance?

Once again – no, the e mail scandal will not force Hillary out of the race. In fact, it might even work to her advantage in 2016 with LIV. My bet is that by December or so the “investigation” will be complete and Hillary won’t be charged…this will work out in the MSM to Hillary being cleared of all wrong-doing and any GOP attempts to bring it up in 2016 will be “why are you re-hashing old news?”. Rely on it: Hillary will only be kept out of the White House by a great candidate running a great campaign. To be sure, this stuff does help a bit by attacking Hillary’s credibility in the overall public mind…but that was already a bit of a given. We have to beat her by beating her. Nothing else will do it for us.

Newest Planned Parenthood video indicates that PP may, from time to time, engage in a bit of infanticide if the child comes out alive. This has been a given in the abortion industry for a long time – you can’t be sure the kid is dead prior to extraction. Almost always, the child is dead – but there’s no way to be 100% certain about it, and so it appears that some children come out alive. The bottom line about abortion is that it is a nasty business where the end-product is a dead child and, very often, a poor woman struggling for years with the mental anguish (you’re “pro-choice” and don’t believe me about that last? Then go here and see. I dare you). Given that it is all about death-dealing, it is bound to be unpleasant in almost all respects. It has gotten a mental pass from the people because the use of euphemism has allowed people to turn aside and pretend they dont’ know what is happening. These videos end all that.

ISIS beheads 82 year old antiquities scholar – in case you forgot that these are savages who need to be defeated.

In better news, a bunch of Yazidi women have formed a military unit to kill ISIS goons. These women, by the way, risk death and worse if they are ever captured by ISIS. What saddens me is that we don’t want to fight ISIS as much as these women do.

They keep telling us that the economy in in great shape and that unemployment is dropping like a rock…but if this is so, why are wages flat? Two possible explanations:

1. There is no job growth and Uncle Sam is just faking the numbers

2. There is job growth but the importation of millions of illegals with Uncle Sam’s encouragement is keeping wages flat.

Take your pick, but either case is bad for the people.

Opening Up the Immigration Debate

Mark Noonan18 Comments

Trump laid out a plan for immigration, and did the GOP a huge favor. From what I gather, Trump’s is for deportation of all illegals and building a secure border. This is far more vigorous than any GOPer has proposed and, indeed, it is probably a plan which would never get majority support. It is also makes things a bit more difficult for the GOP – but at the same time it opens up a gigantic opportunity.

First off, the Democrats love it – not the plan, but that Trump said it as a Republican. They desperately need a divisive, racial issue which can be used to juice up the base for Hillary in 2016. Regardless of what happens to Trump, Democrats will paint the Trump position as the GOP position – and as the Democrats will put it, the GOP plan is cruel deportation. No amount of mealy-mouthed GOP claims to the contrary will matter because, quite simply, the MSM won’t sufficiently report them…but you can bet that they’ll drive this into the ground…it’ll be endless “REPUBLICAN Donald Trump wants to DEPORT ALL ILLEGALS” on replay for days as the MSM drives the Narrative into the public mind. The bottom line is that the Democrats and their MSM lapdogs will try to convince LIVs that the GOP hates Latinos.

Will it work? Of course it will. All it took was one badly answered question and the GOP was hammered successfully with “war on women” twaddle for two election cycles. LIV are LIV for a reason – they don’t know anything other than what the MSM tells them. And the MSM will tell them about Trump and the mean, horrid, racist, cruel Republicans.

Secondly, though, it does open up the field of debate – any GOPer can now be a relative moderate on immigration but still be tough on illegal immigration: he or she just needs to step an inch to the left of Trump. We can condemn both extremes of immigration – mass deportation and open borders, while at the same time calling for real immigration reform which will actually give the United States an immigration policy based upon rational ideas. LIV who have been told that the GOP is a horrid, racist bunch of anti-Latino bigots will eventually get to hear the actual GOP nominee speak about it…and when he or she lays out a rational plan for immigration reform, and then challenges Hillary on the Democrats’ open border nonsense, LIV will have their eyes opened (well, we hope – as long as there isn’t some Kardashian news on the debate nights).

My ideas on immigration start with strict border security – both as a matter of national defense and as an act of mercy towards the illegals: our Progressives will downright refuse to see it, but open borders in the United States merely means that criminal gangs control entry into our nation, and they treat the illegals extremely badly. I’d like to see a modification of birthright citizenship, but I believe any change here would require a Constitutional amendment (I would amend it to say, “any person born to at least one U.S. citizen is a natural born citizen of the United States”, in order to finally clear up forever the entire issue). I’d like to have some sort of guest-worker program. I’d slap a 90% tax on remittances from people in the United States to people in foreign countries (I believe this would, of itself, cause several million illegals to just go back home – they are only here to send money back home and once we stop that, there’s no reason for them to be here), though I’d offer no tax penalty to a guest-worker who takes his savings with him when he leaves (in other words, while he’s working legally as a guest-worker let’s say he saves $10,000.00…if he tries to wire that home, we take $9,000.00…but if he goes home with it, no penalty; massive incentive to leave when your legal time is up). I would explicitly have a program for eventual citizenship for those illegals here for, say, 5 years or longer, who have committed no crimes while inside the United States, who have had children while living in the United States, and who have not sent more than 10% of their gross income back home since arriving in the United States (in other words, I’m getting a path to citizenship for those illegals who’s actions indicate a desire to settle permanently in the United States and become Americans). I believe that any GOPer can take all or part of these ideas and craft an immigration plan which would command majority support.

One thing for certain, Trump has torn the lid off our politically correct political process. Whether this will harm or help the conservative cause long-term remains to be seen. But now that Trump has lanced the boil, it is time for any GOPer who really wants to be President to step up, steal Trump’s thunder and come up with plans which walk the actual middle line between the extremes. We’ll see if anyone does it.

Out and About on a Sunday

Mark Noonan8 Comments

The Dominican Republic (73% racially mixed, 16% white, 11% black) is deporting illegal immigrants. Is there any way our Progressives can describe this as a racist act?

Once we get some rationality in our economic policies, manufacturing will expand in the United States and we’ll stop being so much of a service-sector, consumption-based economy. This may cause a lot of economic problems in China, which lives by exporting to the United States. Can’t say as I’m at all upset about this.

FBI is still looking into the Hillary e mail fracas. Some people are gloating that this will mean the end of Hillary. It won’t. They might find a few people to nail for it – and Hillary might throw a few of her own under the bus – but they won’t get Hillary. They can’t. It is Obama’s Justice Department and they simply won’t let this wind up at Hillary’s door with an indictable offense.

Alabama detective hesitated before defending himself against an attacker. Why did he hesitate? Because he was afraid that deadly force would get him accused of racism. He ended up beaten unconscious. One thing I really appreciate about the Obama years is all the racial healing.

Jeremy Corbyn – mentioned earlier as the possible next leader of Britain’s Labour Party – is pretty rock solid in the anti-Israel camp, as you might have expected.

The University of Georgia has banned hoop skirts. Yes, you read that correctly. Hoop skirts are racist. Trust me on this, we’ll never reach the bottom of liberal stupidity.

Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders…and Jeremy Corbyn

Mark Noonan50 Comments

There is much heart ache out here in GOP Establishment-land about Trump, and I’m sure a lot among the Democrat Establishment about Sanders (though Team Hillary is still acting like her nomination is a coronation and no one need pay attention to Sanders…the GOP is being helpful by releasing videos of the massive Progressive crowds Sanders is drawing; which is encouraging, as it is actually a pretty clever move by the GOP. First time for everything, right?). But who in heck is Jeremy Corbyn, you ask?

I admit that until today I had never heard of him – he’s a candidate for the leadership of Britain’s Labour Party. Generally, when a party gets crushed at the polls in Britain, the losing side then finds a new person to lead to them victory (or, another crushing defeat…but, that isn’t the plan, at any rate). As Labour was blown out of the water a couple months back, they are casting about for someone to restore their party fortunes. Most of the people vying for the post are conventional Labour Party politicians…but Jeremy Corbyn, a backbencher of no great fame, tossed his hat into the ring…and recent polling shows him favored by 53% of Labour voters. So frightened is the Labour Establishment at this, that they even got former Labour PM Tony Blair to pen an op-ed pleading for Labour voters not to vote Corbyn. Blair warns that voting for Corbyn won’t just lead to another Labour defeat, but to the possible extinction of the party!

To be sure, I think that Blair is on to something. Corbyn isn’t just your run-of-the-mill Progressive, folks. His parents were involved on the Republican side during the Spanish Civil war, so Corbyn is a Brit version of our “red diaper babies”. Corbyn, himself, is a member of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, the Socialist Campaign Group and the Stop the War Coalition (which war? Don’t ask – just assume if you want to kill a bad guy, they’re against it). Corbyn wants to nationalize Britain’s railways, provide a “living wage” for everyone, backs animal rights, may favor turning the Falklands over to Argentina, wants to ban the importation of foie gras, and appears to join any group out there with a leftwing cause. This guys is a far left fanatic. But, he’s also a rebel – very often voting against his own party and his Parliamentary expense account is the lowest among all 650 members of Britain’s House of Commons. He’s a kook leftist – but he’s an honest one, my friends. And he looks poised to take leadership of the Labour Party (though we’ll see if the Establishment can squash his bid). Corbyn as leader of Labour would be the perfect opponent for the rather squishy, Establishment types of the Tory party. They’d love to run against him – all they’d have to do is quote him and roll up a 100 seat majority, so you can see why Blair is worried, as are all Establishment types on the left.

I bring this up because these phenomena – a huckster zillionaire, an out-of-touch Boomer socialist, a far left fanatic in Britain – are symptoms of a general rebellion growing against the Establishment. I read today that Sanders drew 29,000 people to a rally. Donald Trump does seem to have faded a bit in the polls, but he’s still riding high. True, in America it is still the silly season of politics. We’re a long way from the first primary ballots and we should all recall that in 2011 a lot of people rode high for a moment, only to flame out before the election even got rolling. But there is a palpable anger and frustration out there. People are sick to death of politics as usual – and especially for the American right, the politics as usual which means we just help the liberals get what they want. The first sign of rebellion in Britain was also on the right, by the way: in the form of the United Kingdom Independence Party – which has risen mostly out of British frustration with the Tories. And if you think our electoral system is hosed, you should see Britain’s – the UKIP got 2.4 million more votes than the Scottish National Party, yet the SNP wound up with 56 seats, UKIP with 1! But, still, the bottom line is that anger with politics as usual boosted UKIP votes by nearly 3 million over their 2010 number. The people are tired – the left want’s genuine leftism; the right wants genuine conservatism. No one wants a left which is actually a bunch of crony-capitalists, nor does anyone want a right which is also crony-capitalist, with a dash of just preserving leftwing policy failures. Left and right I think people want candidates who will fight for what the people believe in. To have it out in a genuine, head-to-head contest which will decide what course the nation will take.

I think we’ll just see more of this as time goes on – and unless the GOP Establishment wakes up, there will be an American version of the UKIP by no later than the 2024 election, with a strong possibility it’ll show up in 2020…and it’ll take out of the GOP, immediately, a couple score House members and a few Senators, likely enough to deny the GOP a Congressional majority. For the Democrats, I see a complete take over by the far left – they really can’t stop it, if the leftwing base really tries. After all, what Democrat can fight against someone shouting the slogans the Democrat Establishment cooked up to gin up their base for 2012? But it can happen that the far left splits from the Democrat party and sets up a Social Democrat Party in time for 2020 or 2024.

Hold on to your hats, folks – it is about to get very interesting.

Clintonerdammerung

Mark Noonan21 Comments

Just too good to pass up:

Now, before you get too excited, Hillary won’t be indicted. She won’t be beaten because she’s corrupt. She should be, but she won’t be. It’ll take a great candidate running a good campaign to win…but, really, it is astonishing that we’ll actually have to beat her in a political campaign.

Ending World War Two

Mark Noonan12 Comments

August 6th was the 70th anniversary of the atomic attack on Hiroshima and there was a lot of the usual hand-wringing about the deed from the usual suspects – Arthur K over at Ace has a good round up of counter-arguments to that sentiment. Most notably the fact that those who complain about the bombing aren’t those soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines who would have had to invade Japan in November of 1945 if the Bomb hadn’t done the trick. I admit to a bias in this area as one of the Marines who would have had to hit the Japanese beaches was my father. There is a high probability that I wouldn’t exist if the Bomb hadn’t been dropped.

People also tend to just not know how savage the Pacific War was. I recently for the first time watched Flags of Our Fathers. It was a bit of a disjointed movie and I won’t put it down as one of Eastwood’s best efforts, but there is a scene in there which moved me nearly to tears. It is when the son of one of the Marines who raise the flag on Suribachi is talking to his aged, now-dying father in the hospital. It reminded me terribly of the last few days I had my father with me. As the story goes, that son never really knew what his father had done in World War Two – he only really found out by going through his father’s things after he died. I never even got that much.

My father never told me about the war. The only thing I ever got out of him was, “it smelled like blood and shit”. His battle was Saipan. Nearly 14,000 American casualties, including more than 3,400 dead – in less than a month of fighting. Japanese dead ran above 50,000, including around 20,000 civilian dead, many of whom committed suicide rather than fall into our hands, because the Japanese military told them we’d murder them all if captured. That is more than 53,000 dead in less than a month in an area less than 45 square miles. Just try, for a moment, to imagine what the place looked like on July 9th, 1944 when the island was declared secure. There must have been bodies just everywhere – and as it was war, the bodies would have been in quite a horrible state. Even if dad didn’t have to engage in hand-to-hand fighting, what his 17 year old eyes must have seen had to have been grim beyond description. Six months prior he was a high school boy living the sheltered life of the United States. And he carried that with him for 65 years. I wondered why he was so distant at times. But I think, now, I understand.

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Regarding “The Donald”

Leo Pusateri15 Comments

Trump

To my good conservative friends- especially those who support “The Donald.”
In these days of milquetoast (or worse) defenses of conservatism by elected leaders, especially the ‘establishment’ GOP leadership, it is easy to get excited over a seemingly unapologetic firebrand who finally articulates much of what you and I have wanted to scream from the mountaintops.

I get that.

But remember what was happening 8 years ago. Many on the left and ‘center-left’ rallied behind a charismatic, well-spoken candidate who nobody really knew much about.

Not that there wasn’t information available. There was information galore about Barack Obama– from his associations with known domestic terrorists, to his belonging to a communist party in Chicago; from his 20-year association with a preacher who preached hate about the United States, to his being mentored by an avowed communist in his earliest days. The information was available to any who wished to do even a cursory internet search.

Many (myself included) tried to warn people about Barack Obama, how he wasn’t the man whom he portrayed himself to be.

But people would have none of it. They looked upon Obama as an open canvas; they looked upon him and projected upon him their greatest hopes, and ignored the reality of his checkered past. They didn’t see a guy raised by communists and people who hated America. They saw a guy descending from Greek columns. They saw ‘the One”–their own personal messiah the one who would finally deliver them to the “Promised Land” and make the sea levels lower and the earth heal. They scoffed at reports of his past, thinking, “Well, even if he did cut his teeth on communism and Islam, he wouldn’t *govern* like one. He would certainly out of a sense of duty and responsibility carry out America’s most time-honored traditions.” And they elected him anyway. The ‘cult of personality’ took over. There was no reasoning with people who refused to be reasoned with.

And we all know how that has turned out.

Now, back to Trump.

Donald Trump does an awfully good job at selling himself. He can sell ice cubes to Eskimos. He is very good at portraying himself as larger than life.

He is very good at ‘portraying’ himself as an unapologetic conservative.

But understand, people. Donald Trump is NO conservative. He has a very long record of taking very progressive stances on everything from border security to abortion to tax policy. He has engaged in crony capitalism, and has been part of the problem all along.

Are we to believe that he REALLY took a 180 on all these issues, just in time for the Republican primary?

Again– I understand how Donald Trump can be appealing. He is charismatic and unapologetic–something we wish more of our elected leaders would be. But let’s leave our passions behind and look at things realistically:

1. Given his long track record of being a crony capitalist and a big-government, pro-abortion progressive, can we reliably count on Donald Trump to actually govern as a conservative?

2. Even if Donald Trump were to attempt to keep his promises (which I have sincere doubts), can he accomplish all that he proposes in a system of checks and balances? Or will he govern with a ‘phone and a pen’ like our current dictator-in-chief?

Let’s not let our passions get in the way of our good judgment. We have an embarrassment of riches in fine candidates such as Ted Cruz, Scott Walker, and Ben Carson who, while admittedly not as charismatic, have long track records of conservative stances and successfully advancing the conservative agenda with reasonable chances that they will govern accordingly.

No more cults of personality, please.

Debate Open Thread

Cluster149 Comments

Carly Fiorina did very well in the early debate. She is a formidable candidate. Can you imagine a Trump/Fiorina ticket? Speaking of Trump, if he can dial down his ego, add more details to his ideas, and act presidential – he just might run away with this. This will be a fun night, well at least for us political junkies.

On the Iran Deal, Obama Gets Tough…

Mark Noonan10 Comments

With his fellow Americans, of course – not with the Iranians:

President Obama: I realize that resorting to force may be tempting in the face of the rhetoric and behavior that emanates from parts of Iran. It is offensive. It is incendiary. We do take it seriously. But superpowers should not act impulsively in response to talks… Just because Iranian hardliners chant ‘Death to America” does not mean that that’s what all Iranians believe. In fact, it’s those hardliners that are more satisfied with the status quo. It’s those hardliners chanting “death to America” who’ve been most opposed to the deal. They’re making common cause with the Republican Caucus.

So, there you go – the only people who want to kill the Iran deal are those on the side of the Iranian hardliners! Kerry is also out there warning us against upsetting the Iranian hardliners…and they’ll be mad as wet hens if we don’t do this deal! So mad, I guess, that they’ll start sponsoring terrorism and building up nuclear weapons…

This is getting unreal – the Obama position is that if you don’t want his deal, then you want war. Here’s just a small bit of advice for Obama and Kerry – the alternative to the deal isn’t war, but simply no deal. Status quo. And that means Iran’s government is still hobbled by sanctions and has much fewer resources for sponsoring terrorism and building nuclear weapons.

To me, the whole thing is clearly not about getting Iran to stop being Iran, but about getting sanctions lifted. Obama and Kerry appear to believe that we can befriend Iran’s current government and they’ll work with us for peace and stability in the Middle East…that it will be a peace of the grave for many and the stability of Iranian tyranny doesn’t seem to concern Obama. To Progressives any sort of peace is superior to any sort of war – and if it is a bunch of foreigners living far away who are paying the blood price for our peace, no problem at all.

Of course, we’ll get war, eventually. The thing about helping tyrannical regimes to gain in power and prosperity is that this merely provides them with more sinews for war, as well as convincing them we are a paper tiger which can be defied at will.