Obama’s Continuing Assault on the Law, History, and Facts

In the wake of President Obama’s moronic and widely-lampooned comments on judicial review yesterday, President Obama offered the following lame (and incorrect) walkback today:

THE PRESIDENT:  Well, first of all, let me be very specific. We have not seen a Court overturn a law that was passed by Congress on a economic issue, like health care, that I think most people would clearly consider commerce — a law like that has not been overturned at least since Lochner.  Right?  So we’re going back to the ’30s, pre New Deal.

And the point I was making is that the Supreme Court is the final say on our Constitution and our laws, and all of us have to respect it, but it’s precisely because of that extraordinary power that the Court has traditionally exercised significant restraint and deference to our duly elected legislature, our Congress.  And so the burden is on those who would overturn a law like this.

The President, of course, is once again either displaying complete ignorance or cynical hackery. Our federal Congress, per the constitution, is a Congress of enumerated powers. It may only do the things which it is authorized to do under Article 1, Section 8. The onus is always on Congress to demonstrate that its actions have fallen within one of its enumerated powers, not on a person challenging an act of Congress to demonstrate that Congress has acted without those powers. However, more importantly, as Powerline pointed out, Obama has once again also gotten his history wrong:

 Is there any truth to Obama’s claim that the Supreme Court hasn’t invalidated any statutes that are “economic” and relate to “commerce” since Lochner v. New York, which was in 1905? Of course not. To name just a few examples a great deal more recent than 1905, the Court ruled unconstitutional provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act that had permitted only “for cause” removal of members of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board in 2010; the 1990 Mushroom Promotion, Research and Consumer Information Act in 2001 (this case was actually quite similar to Obamacare because the Court held unconstitutional provisions that required mushroom growers to contribute to mushroom promotion programs); provisions of the Patent and Plant Variety Remedy Clarification Act, the Trademark Remedy Clarification Act, and the Copyright Remedy Clarification Act in 1992; the Harbor Maintenance Tax Act in 1998; the Transfer Act which authorized the transfer of operating control of Washington National Airport and Dulles International Airport from the Department of Transportation to the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority in 1991; and many, many more dating back to 1905.

Obama’s bungling on this (which has yet to be called a “gaffe” or more properly “a series of lies” by anyone I’ve yet seen in the media) prompted the Fifth Circuit yesterday to ask a DOJ lawyer who was litigating a case concerning Obamacare to clarify whether the DOJ was now taking the position that the federal judiciary did not have the power to overturn Obamacare. Some folks on the left went absolutely apopleptic over this, because it was an unusual event. Mostly, however, that is because most lawyers aren’t cursed with clients who are dumb enough to say, on the news, that the court currently deciding their case has no legitimate authority to do so. As was pointed out at Hot Air, Obama is the head of the DOJ and the Fifth Circuit was entitled to know if Obama’s statements signaled a change in the government’s position during this litigation.

One final point is in order here, which is to clarify for President Obama what is meant by an activist judiciary. An activist judiciary is not one that strikes down laws passed by Congress. An activist judiciary is one that strikes down laws passed by Congress for reasons that cannot be fairly said to be contained within the text of the Constitution, or more properly one that invents law from the bench.

Allow me to helpfully illustrate. Most conservatives were in favor (generally speaking) of the Gramm-Rudman-Hollings Act, which was  passed with broad, bipartisan support in both chambers of Congress. When the Supreme Court struck this act down, I don’t recall any conservative accusing the Court of engaging in judicial activism, because the Court’s reason for striking the bill down was firmly rooted in the text of the Constitution. By way of contrast, an excellent example of judicial activism would be virtually every SCOTUS Eighth Amendment decision for the last 65 years. The plain text of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments indicate that the government can constitutionally take a person’s life (so long as he or she is afforded due process of law). At the time these amendments were enacted, capital punishment was virtually the uniform punishment for all felonies. Nonetheless, the Supreme Court has taken it upon itself to declare the death penalty unconstitutional for every crime other than murder, despite the fact that neither the text of the constitution nor history compels this result. At one point, the Supreme Court actually declared that the death penalty was unconstitutional, despite the fact that the constitution explicitly provides for the death penalty. This is what is meant by “judicial activism,” not “striking down statutes that were passed by Congress.”

It would be helpful, if the President wants to debate using conservative terms, if he took the time to understand what they meant.

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From Hope to Hopelessness: Obama’s Economy Has 88 Million “Not In Labor Force”

It was less than a year ago that Barack Obama’s senior adviser, David Plouffe said:

After 2½ years in office, President Obama now “owns” the economy as an issue, according to top adviser David Plouffe, who added he was confident that voters understand that recovering from a devastating recession Mr. Obama inherited takes time.

“Of course he does,” Mr. Plouffe told NBC’s “Today” show host Matt Lauer when asked point-blank if Mr. Obama owns the economy.

“But the American people understand that we — it took us a long time to get to this mess,” Mr. Plouffe said. “It’s going to take us some time to come out. We are making progress.”

Well, after Friday’s jobs numbers came out (the economy added 120,000 jobs) Labor Secretary Hilda Solis promptly proclaimed: “That’s a noteworthy achievement.”

In fact, for the man who campaigned on the message of “hope” in 2008, the 120,000 jobs added is much fewer (about half) than expected and the edging down of the unemployment to 8.2% is not from job creation but from hopelessness.

There are now 88 million American who are “Not In Labor Force,” according to Department of Labor statistics, which the St. Louis Federal Reserve put into this pretty chart:

Obviously, others are seeing past Obama’s cheerleaders.

The Wall Street Journal stated:

But mostly, the picture was disappointing at a time when all eyes are on the U.S. to help keep global growth humming. The jobless rate, which is obtained from a separate survey of households, edged down to 8.2% from 8.3%, its lowest point in three years. However, that decline was due less to new hiring than people abandoning their job searches.

“I’m nervous,” said Jared Bernstein, former chief economist* for Vice President Joe Biden.

* Although Bernstein, according to his bio, is not really a trained-economist (he just played one in Washington), he is right to be nervous.

And, so should the Obama Administration.

The hard truth for Barack Obama is:

People have given up.

They have gone from ‘Hope’ to Hopelessness.

_________________

“Truth isn’t mean. It’s truth.”
Andrew Breitbart (1969-2012)

Cross-posted on LaborUnionReport.com

On Twitter.

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Morning Briefing for April 5, 2012

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April 5, 2012Go to www.RedStateMB.com to get
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At last, the long winter of our discontent is over. America’s pastime has returned to its home fields. Last night, the World Champion Cardinals took on the revamped Miami Marlins in the United States opener. Today, the other 28 teams return to work. Although the game has changed to a huge extent since the days when fielders (including catchers) played barehanded and pitchers threw underhanded from 50 feet, and although the game has become almost as international in character as soccer, as fans file into stands today and tomorrow bedecked in their favorite team’s gear, baseball remains an affirmation of the rebirth of spring and of our uniquely American sense of community and competition. And for fans of all 30 teams (except the Astros), it is a day of eternal hope.

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In a story about the White House in damage control mode over the President’s rather stupid remarks on the Supreme Court, Reuters reports the following:

“What he did was make an unremarkable observation about 80 years of Supreme Court history,” Carney told reporters during a White House briefing dominated by the topic.

and

The president, who taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago, qualified the remark a day later by stressing he meant action by the Court on a matter of commerce, a legal distinction that cut little ice with his critics.

and

“

Since the 1930s the Supreme Court has without exception deferred to Congress when it comes to Congress’s authority to pass legislation to regulate matters of national economic importance such as health care, 80 years,” Carney said.

What Reuters did not bother to report is that, in fact, the Supreme Court has ruled unconstitutional a piece of legislation that passed with a bipartisan majority via the commerce clause just 17 years ago.

Please click here for the rest of the post.

What a miserable question to have to ask about Nebraska Attorney General and Republican Senate Candidate Jon Bruning — in effect is he, at best, a creepy pervert and at worst a monster. But before you pick up pitch forks and torches against me for asking the question, you need to understand that this is Jon Bruning’s own tortured logic in the Nebraska Senate Republican Primary.

Jon Bruning, the Attorney General of Nebraska all but accused his primary opponent, Don Stenberg, of being a pedophile. Bruning did so in a Senate primary debate when the debate kept coming back to Jon Bruning still defending Barack Obama’s Attorney General, Eric Holder.

I wish I were making it up, but I am not. Even the Democrats in Nebraska had to jump in and point out that based on Jon Bruning’s “evidence” about Don Stenberg, Jon Bruning is guilty of the same.

I warned each and every one of you that Jon Bruning had a reputation for being a hot head who would meltdown under the pressure of a campaign. As appalling as it is, he has done so. If he’s resorting to suggesting his primary opponent is a pedophile to distract from inconvenient facts about his support of Eric Holder, to what new depths will the man sink in a general election? To what extent will he embarrass the GOP?

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In the wake of President Obama’s moronic and widely-lampooned comments on judicial review yesterday, President Obama offered the following lame (and incorrect) walkback .

Please click here for the rest of the post.

It’s a valid question, I think, given the way that Lawrence O’Donnell viciously and insultingly went after Mormonism last night on that network. Goodness knows that I have my problems with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. And I have no intention of converting to the LDS faith any time soon, or indeed at all. But to say “Mormonism was created by a guy in upstate New York in 1830 when he got caught having sex with the maid and explained to his wife that God told him to do it” in the pursuit of crude partisan purposes is an insult that splatters far beyond its designated target (in this case, Mitt Romney).

I understand that Harry Reid was a boxer, when younger. If the Senator takes this punch without hitting back, then those days are long gone for him, indeed.

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What’s worse than Congress picking winners and losers and distorting the free-market with bailouts, stimulus, and tendentious interventions on behalf of specific industries? Unelected members of the Federal Reserve doing the same through monetary policy.

It is amazing to watch how many Republicans will speak with such conviction against Keynesian fiscal stimulus policies, yet they will fervently promote monetary stimulus policies by the unaccountable Federal Reserve. Their support for near-zero interest rates, quantitative easing, bailouts, and intervention in the housing sector has muddled our message against Obama’s anti-free-market policies. Moreover, in this time of record commodity prices, pro-(monetary) stimulus Republicans preclude us from showing how government intervention on behalf of special interests distorts the markets, depletes savings, and devalues the currency – a winning political argument if there ever was one.

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America is addicted to chocolate. Foreign chocolate.

A majority of us consume chocolate each day. Although the U.S. produces only 6% of the world’s cocoa, we consume more than 20%.

The threat is obvious. It’s time for government to step in and promote alternatives.

Any day, President Obama will be barnstorming the country to tell us, “If we really want chocolate security and chocolate independence, we’ve got to start looking at how we use less cocoa and use sources that we can renew and that we can control, so we are not subject to the whims of what’s happening in other countries.”

Today, we are at the mercy of Africa, which produces over 75% of the world’s cocoa. That’s an unstable source, which means our chocolate dependency undermines national security.

Each of us probably began with that first innocent M&M but now it’s an unsustainable $13-billion a year habit. The average American eats 11 pounds of chocolate per year. We gain weight from chocolate. Pimples get blamed on chocolate.

Fortunately, alternatives exist. With proper federal loans and subsidies these can relieve our cravings and wean us from our addiction to chocolate.

Please click here for the rest of the post.

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Good Friday 2012

And they crucified him, and parted his garments, casting lots: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, They parted my garments among them, and upon my vesture did they cast lots.  And sitting down they watched him there;  And set up over his head his accusation written, THIS IS JESUS THE KING OF THE JEWS.

. . . .

Now from the sixth hour there was darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour.  And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?  Some of them that stood there, when they heard that, said, This man calleth for Elias.  And straightway one of them ran, and took a spunge, and filled it with vinegar, and put it on a reed, and gave him to drink.

The rest said, Let be, let us see whether Elias will come to save him.  Jesus, when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost.  And, behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom; and the earth did quake, and the rocks rent; And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, and came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.

The Gospel of Matthew 27:35-37, 45-53

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Tech at Night: Live from Virginia: Human Trafficking, Cybersecurity

I’m back, having gotten myself and my worldly possessions from southern California to northern Virginia. I also have a backlog of items that I’m never going to cover completely tonight, so some issues are going to wait until Monday. So please, check back Monday. There are things I’d love to cover tonight, but I simply lack the time.

Let’s start with Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) and Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) joining up to press Google to do something about the advertising of human trafficking services. Some people are going to have a knee-jerk reaction to this, call it a for-the-children threat to censor. But it’s not. The “child pornography” card gets pulled for all sorts of power grabs, but this isn’t about pictures on the Internet, either of real or made-up people. This is about the actual kidnapping and enslaving of people, including children. That is legitimate cause for action.

And note that Blackburn is would be perfectly happy for Google to do something about it, setting an industry standard, and end the need for government action of any kind. That’s commendable. Because you know what? Industry can act to emulate legislation and do so more effectively than government ever will.

So, how about some cybersecurity?

If we’re going to pass a bill at all, and we probably should given the rise of criminal and anarchist attacks trying to take down all world governments, we need to pass the SECURE IT bills introduced by McCain and co. in the Senate, and by Blackburn and co. in the House. Heightened criminal penalties, lowered barriers to defensive information sharing, and no government power grab. What’s not to like?

Information, not regulation, is the most powerful too in the box for fighting online attacks. Honest people need to be informed of possible attacks by domestic businesses or by foreign entities. SECURE IT tries to help information sharing. That’s what we need.

What we don’t need is to bring DHS in to regulate private industry, which is what Joe Lieberman and Susan Collins want. John McCain, not the staunchest advocate of free markets after his recent Augusta National comments, even sees the glaring problems here when he’s saying “A super-regulator like DHS would impact free-market forces.”

Note an interesting problem here: industries we’re most worried about are already regulated. Utilities, banks, doctors, airports, and others already have government breathing down their necks. If we bring DHS into it, we’re multiplying obligations and creating redundancy. That’s harmful, not helpful. Security requires clarity of design and of purpose. Mistakes come with complexity, and successful attacks are born in mistakes.

Democrat Chris Dodd may want to revive PROTECT IP in the Senate, but as long as the House leadership won’t budge on SOPA, its House counterpart, that’s not happening.

It may be time to Play the Sad Trombone for LightSquared. Losing Sprint had to hurt. A lot.

Tune in Monday for Internet Sales Tax failures, ACU vs Jim DeMint(!), and more that I didn’t cover tonight because I had to go to the grocery store, as I had no food in my new home and wanted to go pick some up before 2am.

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Re: Santorum speaks at Supreme Court about Obamacare

Santorum made a strong case yesterday at the steps of the Supreme Court that Romney cannot make the case against Obamacare in the general election since Romneycare was the blueprint for Obamacare. What a great move by Santorum on the first day that Obamacare is in the Supreme Court. I think for the first time his message that Romney is uniquely disqualified on this issue is getting heard by a much larger audience. Even with the bulls–t comment a couple of days ago, that was the argument he was making.

This one issue has now become his central issue, and it couldn’t be at a better time. Let’s hope people in Wisconsin are listening:

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By Jon Bruning’s Own Logic, Is He Into Gay Marriage and Inappropriate Relationships With Kids?

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

What a miserable question to have to ask about Nebraska Attorney General and Republican Senate Candidate Jon Bruning — in effect is he, at best, a creepy pervert and at worst a monster. But before you pick up pitch forks and torches against me for asking the question, you need to understand that this is Jon Bruning’s own tortured logic in the Nebraska Senate Republican Primary.

Jon Bruning, the Attorney General of Nebraska all but accused his primary opponent, Don Stenberg, of being a pedophile. Bruning did so in a Senate primary debate when the debate kept coming back to Jon Bruning still defending Barack Obama’s Attorney General, Eric Holder.

I wish I were making it up, but I am not. Even the Democrats in Nebraska had to jump in and point out that based on Jon Bruning’s “evidence” about Don Stenberg, Jon Bruning is guilty of the same.

I warned each and every one of you that Jon Bruning had a reputation for being a hot head who would meltdown under the pressure of a campaign. As appalling as it is, he has done so. If he’s resorting to suggesting his primary opponent is a pedophile to distract from inconvenient facts about his support of Eric Holder, to what new depths will the man sink in a general election? To what extent will he embarrass the GOP?

Two nights ago the Nebraska Republicans had a Senate primary debate. When Bruning was pressed on his support for Eric Holder, he deflected and lobbed a bombshell attack against State Treasurer Don Stenberg. He claimed that Stenberg inappropriately tried to follow his 14-year-old daughter on Twitter.

I thought he was just going to say Stenberg was guilty of dragging his family into the race as a way to dig up dirt. But no. Bruning said it was “weird” and “creepy” for a “62-year-old man” to follow a “14-year-old girl” on Twitter. Of course Don Stenberg doesn’t manage his Twitter account and campaigns typically follow lots of people they don’t know and even follow their opponents’ families’ twitter accounts. But Bruning, who I bet does not manage his own twitter account, claimed Stenberg’s campaign tried to follow Bruning’s daughter as evidence that Stenberg is a pedophile.

Yesterday, the Democrats highlighted that Bruning is following several teenage girls on Twitter. Oops. And there’s still no evidence that Stenberg’s campaign requested access to Bruning’s daughter’s locked account.

When someone tries to follow a locked account on Twitter, the owner of the locked account receives an email request to do so. Bruning’s campaign has yet to come forward with that email. Even if it did, the campaign cannot show that Stenberg himself manages his own Twitter account.

Conservatives should avoid Jon Bruning like the plague. He didn’t want to defend his outrageous support for Eric Holder so he made a wild, unsubstantiated attack against an honorable man. He’s used to doing whatever is necessary to win elections. That’s why he’s been on both sides of nearly every issue and it’s why he’s smearing Stenberg today.

Oh, and by Jon Bruning’s own logic, I presume he is a supporter of same sex marriage and gay rights. As you can see from this screenshot, in addition to following several teenage girls on Twitter, Jon Bruning also follows the NOH8 campaign on Twitter — the gay rights group advocating against Proposition 8 in California.

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On Faith This Good Friday

There have been a number of times throughout my life that I have encountered God’s blessings, his mercy, and his discipline.

When I was little, I sat in my grandmother’s lap hearing stories of Daniel in the Lion’s Den.

When I was a teenager, I could see God working in my life.

When I was in college, I could feel his call.

When I got married and and had kids and was told my wife would die (she did not), I could feel his peace.

I am convinced the Big Guy Upstairs is real, not that I’d ever doubted. There was no doubting in my mind that He was both very real and very involved — not an abstract or detached Creator. This pattern has repeated itself throughout my life, sometimes to my liking and sometimes definitely not to my liking. But still, it played out.

A few years ago, my wife decided to leave her job to stay home with our children. We could not make ends meet if she did it, so we prayed fervently about what to do. We decided God would provide. She left her job, our insurance, and our safety net. Within three days I received a pay raise for the first time in three years equal to my wife’s salary. Within a week, CNN came calling. WIthin a year, WSB Radio needed someone to replace Herman Cain on the radio. None of this would have been possible had my wife not felt compelled to be a stay at home mom.

Some will look at all this and chalk it up to coincidence or luck or even my own skill. But I know I am not that lucky and I am not that skillful.

At this time of year we are confronted with the question of whether He is real. C. S. Lewis wrote in Mere Christianity, “A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic-on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg-or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse.”

We see the hostility of this world to Christ and must often remind ourselves that this world does hate Christ and those things of Christ and people of Christ. The Media Research Center brings word this morning about Queer Christ, the Christ who really is not for the people who really are not. I used that line on twitter and there has been an outpouring of condemnation.

I get that many want to wrap themselves up in Christ and feel the right wants a monopoly on Christ, but as much as those of us on the right need to do more to show we realize we don’t have a monopoly on Christ, the left needs to understand that it has obligations too. Anything goes does not go with Christ. We are not to judge, but we are to apply the standards Christ and his Apostles set forth as we live our live. We are to know right from wrong and to recognize there really is a right and a wrong and a moral and an immoral and a good and an evil.

Christ is not political. He is righteous.

The funniest comment about my link to the MRC story on Queer Christ was from a kid on Facebook who said, “(I don’t actually believe in your Jesus, but I do enjoy stuff like this as it proves none of you have learned anything from the Gospels.” It is always humorous to see one who does not believe claiming we know nothing from the Gospels.

Christ is for everyone, but not everyone wants him as he truly is. They want their Christ. Everyone, all of us, fall into that trap. But some refuse to recognize it and get out of it. They want their sin and their Jesus.

Over the next three days we remember the three days that have had a bigger impact on the history of mankind than any other. You can deny that Christ was crucified, despite historic, secular sources that confirm the event. You can deny that Christ rose again from the dead.

What you cannot deny is that what so many treat as fact and others scorn as cheap, recycled myth has shaped art, science, culture, literature, and government more profoundly than any other event.

I personally have a hard time believing that any myth would be so powerful and so lasting. Today we remember Christ’s death. On Sunday, we remember He lives.

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Snatching Defeat From The Jaws of Victory: Texas Primary Update

My first introduction to politics was at 10 years old, volunteering with my parents on a State House campaign. What hooked me on political involvement was that we lost by 12 votes on a re-count and I knew that even at 10 years old I could have found 13 more votes if I’d have worked harder. 

The promise I’ve made myself in every election cycle since is that no matter what capacity I was working in, I would give everything I’ve got and that win or lose, I would know there wasn’t anything else I could have done to send my candidate to victory.

For the last three years I’ve been working full-time in conservative grassroots politics, training activists, identifying and equipping candidates. That’s been my universe and Texas has been at the center of it. During that time I’ve had the privilege of training and interacting with thousands of TEA Partiers and conservative activists who wan’t to move our state and country in the right direction.

Hundreds of thousands of conservatives across Texas have dedicated millions of man hours to get conservative candidates on the ballot for state office and volunteering for conservative causes during that time. All of this work now stands in peril.

After three years of preparation for this battle, the volunteer showing, financial contributions and effort from Texans for these state level races is frankly pathetic.

I’ve discussed this problem with TEA Party leaders, candidates and outside observers and it’s clear that the perception isn’t some figment of my imagination. The fact is that after three years of demanding conservative candidates and promising that they’d charge into fire to get them elected, Texas conservatives are on the verge of wasting a unprecedented opportunity.

Some of this is due to behind the scenes disputes and friction between big egos. Resurgent apathy and frustration with Federal level politics also plays a role. Neither of these are acceptable reasons to stand on the side lines.

We can argue about hurt feelings after we win. Until then, nobody on the left cares and we’ll accomplish nothing.

The Texas Primary Election is less than 2 months away. May 29 is D-day. There will only be about 10 competitive state house races in November but there are more than 60 state house primary elections in play on May 29! In some we’re playing defense (as with James White and David Simpson) but in most races we’re playing offense and have got strong conservatives on the ballot who have stepped up to our call of the last three years.

In the face of these incredible opportunities, we’re about to do what establishmentarians have said would happen all along!

If Texans don’t step up and make a statement on May 29th then much of the last three years will have been wasted effort. The preconceived notions of liberals within the Republican party will have been confirmed and we will have sent a generation of conservative candidates to be used as cannon fodder.

The primary election is really the only time that the vote of conservative Texans matters. We will vote in November for a Republican President & Senator, only a few US House seats will be competitive (if that) and the state legislatures will only have a handful of seats in play.

I’m confident that if I asked any group of conservatives or TEA partiers whether they would give their life for their country that every hand would raise. However, if I followed that up by asking for commitments to spend two hours block-walking or phone banking for conservative candidates, the hands would rapidly fall.

We’re not being asked to die for our country, risk our sacred honor, or even give up much of our modest fortunes. What we’re being asked to do, and what we must do to win, is commit to dedicating a few hours of our time between now and May 29th for a conservative candidate near us.

No number of hours spent in October will make up for a missed opportunity this May. There will be no chance for redemption.

The beauty of our situation is that it doesn’t require some Herculean effort to make a difference. A few hours of your time spent volunteering for a campaign, talking to your friends, registering voters or driving people to the polls could determine the outcome of these state and local races.

If you’re a conservative who wants to impact Texas’ future then now is your chance. It’s time to take action!

For a list of State House and Senate campaigns you can volunteer for, go to the Texas Action candidate database. 

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Restoring America’s Image In The World; The Canadian Edition

Now, in fairness though I’ve got to say that Canada’s interests here are a little bit different. And particularly, I might as well be frank, particularly in light of the…of the interim decision at least on Keystone. …. Our energy [issue] is the necessity of diversifying our energy export markets. We can not be, as a country, in a situation where really our one energy partner could say no to our energy products. …. when it comes to oil in particular, we do face a significant discount on the marketplace because of the fact that we’re a captive supplier. We have made it clear to the people of Canada, one of our national priorities is to make sure that we have the infrastructure and the capacity to export our energy products outside of North America.

– Canadian PM Stephen Harper

One of Barack Obama’s most obnoxious and arrogant campaign promises was his pledge to “restore America’s image throughout the rest of the world.” Well, it appears I’ll have to eat crow on this one. President Barack Obama has totally turned back the clock on how America is viewed abroad. This is particularly true with respect to Mexico and Canada.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper brims with great frustration at how he has been treated by our current US President. It’s almost as if someone has hit a “Reset” Button back to the Jolly Old Days of The Oregon Boundary Dispute.

During the Election of 1844, a Democratic Party Presidential candidate, James Knox Polk, decided he would run as an expansionist candidate. He was locked in a dispute with the British Government over who would control how much of the Oregon Territory. He staked out a position in favor of “Manifest Destiny” and his supporters demanded that US territory include “All Oregon” with the boundary at “Fifty-Four Forty or Fight.” He later only accepted a border at Forty-Nine North because he was too busy fighting with Mexicans over Texas.

Now this probably wasn’t the US image that Barack Obama chose to restore when he made his grandiose and hateful apology for most of America’s history during a 2009 speech in Cairo, Egypt. Instead, America with Barack Obama as President is once again an evil, greedy, conniving neighbor that dominates others and connives to work against the interests of anyone unfortunate enough to share the same hemisphere.

A little known fact about NAFTA (never mentioned amongst our mordant fears of Mexican trucks on American highways) involves the fact that US gets a major price break on petroleum products from Canada under the deal. In return for their loyalty and consideration, Barack Obama has gotten on the phones and lobbied Democratic Party Senators to block the Keystone XL Pipeline. Canadian Prime Minister Harper seems prepared to terminate the US “Good Neighbor Discount.”

Energy has become a searing rift between the U.S. and Canada and threatens to leave the U.S. without its top energy supplier. The Winnipeg Free Press reported that Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper warned Obama the U.S. will have to pay market prices for its Canadian oil after Obama’s de facto veto of the Keystone XL pipeline. Canada is preparing to sell its oil to China. Until now, NAFTA had shielded the U.S. from having to pay global prices for Canadian oil. That’s about to change.

So that $4 gas you were whinnying about, don’t worry. Relax. President Obama may have just totally taken care of that one for us. I can’t wait to log into GasBuddy.com and check out all the hope and change that erupts when Canada starts charging us the same price on crude that we get from The Saudis.

Barack Obama inherited a situation where the world’s 3rd largest petroleum producer was giving the American motorist the home town discount. All we had to do was build them a decent pipeline to Texas in an expeditious manner. Our new image in the eyes of the world is that we couldn’t be trusted to hold up our end on one of the best trade deals we’ve ever been given in our nation’s history. Good God, I hope this error ends in January 2013.

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Hate Mail From a PBS/LA School District Employee

He’s a Producer/Director for KLCS-TV/DT, The Education Station. We know because he used his work address.

From: brian.heffron@lausd.net
Subject: Congratulations!
Date: April 3, 2012 4:18:44 PM EDT
To: contact@redstate.com

Congratulations, Gentlemen! (We know that no decent woman would be caught dead in your offices. Right on!) Your site has won the coveted Most Bigoted , Misogynist & Racist Website on the Entire Internet Award!

What a tremendous accomplishment! And you certainly could not have done it without all the many dark and vicious comments from knucklehead commenters on your site who hail from over the southern, former slave state, portion of this great nation!

This singular recognition means you will go down in history as the most intolerant, evil, and backward website ever run by wing nuts who could speak in complete sentences! Keep up the bad work and you will definitely wind up never having any effect at all, none at all, on any issue in our wonderful country! Why? Because as us regular Americans learn more about just how base and moronic your 1% ideas and greedy plans truly are, they will continue to turn their backs on you “republics” in droves!~ Wave bye-bye to the Independent vote and the Hispanic vote, although they may bow to your blustery hatred of emigrants, they will most certainly not vote for your candidate! Even if you pick a Hispanic VP. They’ll see right through that, plus Cubans are different from the rest of the Hispanic world, but you would not know any thing at all about a subtlety like that or you wouldn’t win this wonderful award!!

No way, Jose! : )

Please send $2000 for your trophy and certificate which depicts a lynching from the good old days!

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An Invitation to Tune In on Good Friday

As regular readers know, I have a political talk show on WSB Radio out of Atlanta each weeknight from 6pm to 9pm. It’s the nation’s largest talk radio station and I figure if I have to work on Good Friday, I might as well use the platform well.

So each Good Friday night, we play the music a bit longer, actually play the words, and throw in some Johnny Cash. We talk about higher order topics, matters of faith, matters of good and evil, and personal stuff. It’s the one show i dread doing each year and the one I feel most compelled to do.

You are invited to tune in tonight and, if you feel like it, join in.

The WSB signal is so strong, you may be able to pick it up in your car. It is out of Atlanta, but I know people in Texas, Louisiana, Missouri, and Virginia pick it up pretty well on the AM band. The signal comes from 750 AM and 95.5 FM. Online works well too. There’s also an iPhone app and you can get the Erick Erickson Show podcast via iTunes.

You can listen live tonight on the WSB live stream starting at 6:00 p.m. ET tonight going until 9:00 p.m. You can call in at 1-800-WSB-TALK.

Consider this an open thread and this post will float up the site throughout the day.

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Sherrod Brown Compares GOP Governors to Hitler, Stalin

Promoted from diaries.

Last year while governors across the Midwest worked to reform broken public union laws, Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) slandered them in a speech that could have easily been written by one of the millionaire “leaders” at SEIU, NEA, or AFSCME.

During one of his stemwinders about the wondrous things unions do, Sherrod dropped a reductio ad Hitlerum on Governor Kasich (OH), Governor Walker (WI), and Governor Christie (NJ):

Bizarrely, Sherrod claims he’s not comparing Kasich, Walker, and Christie to Hitler, Stalin, and Mubarak in the middle of comparing them to Hitler, Stalin, and Mubarak. While he’s conflating overdue reforms with mass murder, Sherrod also repeats one of his favorite deceptions by pretending government unions are the same as private industry unions.

Several media outlets noted the dictatorial portion of Sherrod’s rant, and the next day he apologized for stepping in it:

“But in speaking about this, I should not have mentioned the hostility of tyrants like Hitler to unions,” Brown said. “I don’t want my mistake to distract from the critical debate in Ohio, and I apologize for it.”

Sherrod didn’t want “to distract from the critical debate” over public union reform! Even now, slamming Ohio’s Senate Bill 5 as an “attack on workers” is the cornerstone of Sherrod’s stump speech – yet he always runs out of time before debating any of the critical specifics. Big Labor’s opponents are evil because it’s evil to oppose Big Labor.

Sherrod Brown is desperate to get additional mileage out of the union bosses’ $40 million smear campaign, but remember what was actually in Ohio’s union reform bill:

Replace automatic step increases with merit pay for public workers.Require public employees to pay 10% of their pension costs and 15% of their health insurance costs.End forced payment of “fair-share” fees for public workers who don’t want to join a union.End last-in, first-out firing policies, requiring considerations other than tenure when local governments must make layoffs.Public workers retain the privilege of collective bargaining for wages & working conditions, but may no longer go on strike against the public.

No less the Progressive than FDR, patron saint of caring Democrats, knew public unions are an awful idea. Either Sherrod Brown is too dense to recognize government and private industry are different, or he’s been lying for years to protect his favorite interest group.

Footnote: This clip is from the same speech where Sherrod claimed public union reform violates Christian principles. Refer again to the bullet points above; those are the sort of hateful reforms that get you slandered on the Senate floor as a tyrannical heathen by Sherrod Brown.

Transcript of the C-SPAN clip follows.

Sherrod Brown: Because we, as a country, we stand for a more egalitarian workforce. We stand for worker rights. We believe workers should organize and bargain collectively, if they choose. We believe in a minimum wage. We believe in workers’ compensation. We believe in worker safety. We believe in human rights, and all of that is about the labor movement, and, you know, you can support labor rights in Guatemala, but you better damn be sure you’re supporting labor rights in Wilmington, and Columbus, and Cleveland, and, and Detroit, and Dover, Delaware, and everywhere else.

And that’s, um, that’s, those were, those were some of the words Secretary Clinton said – I’m obviously expanding on them – but, as a nation, you know, I I I I look back at history and some of the worst governments we’ve ever had, you know one of the first things they did? They went after the trade unions. Hitler didn’t want unions, Stalin didn’t want unions, Mubarak didn’t want independent unions. These, these autocrats in history don’t want independent unions. So when I see, when I see in Egypt, or if I see in, in the old Soviet Russia, or I see – history tells me about Germany – I, I, I’m not, I’m not comparing what’s happening to the workers in Madison or in Columbus to Hitler and Stalin, but I am saying that history teaches us that unions are a very positive force in society that creates a middle class and that protects our freedom.

Cross-posted from jasonahart.com

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Re: Santorum speaks at Supreme Court about Obamacare

Santorum made a strong case yesterday at the steps of the Supreme Court that Romney cannot make the case against Obamacare in the general election since Romneycare was the blueprint for Obamacare. What a great move by Santorum on the first day that Obamacare is in the Supreme Court. I think for the first time his message that Romney is uniquely disqualified on this issue is getting heard by a much larger audience. Even with the bulls–t comment a couple of days ago, that was the argument he was making.

This one issue has now become his central issue, and it couldn’t be at a better time. Let’s hope people in Wisconsin are listening:

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Interesting: epithet-tossing Jewish liaison Dani Gilbert daughter of Obama bundlers.

Via Legal Insurrection comes this interesting story about DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz and her rather embarrassing Jewish liaison Dani Gilbert.  As you may remember, Ms. Gilbert had some unfortunate comments surface from her Facebook page – essentially, stuff from 2006 where she used admittedly self-derogatory religious/cultural epithets.  At the time, I wondered when exactly DWS had hired the young woman – just on the off chance that the DNC chair had knowingly hired an underaged drinker, which the DNC chair is certainly dumb enough to do.  It turns out that this was a new hire (for the DNC position, at least)… but, hey, that’s where this gets interesting!

Turns out that the DNC already had a Jewish liaison – Ira Forman.  Mr. Forman brings to the table a large amount of experience, as one would expect from a former executive director of the National Jewish Democratic Council.  But he’s just one person – and not the daughter of two Florida Democratic bundlers who put together 500K for the Obama campaign, which is apparently Ms. Gilbert’s primary qualification for the job.  Shockingly, it’s being reported that the Obama administration recognized that Ms. Gilbert may not have been the most suitable candidate for this position; even more shockingly, Debbie Wasserman Schultz defied them… actually, not shockingly.  The Gilberts are also very heavy donor’s to Wasserman Schultz’s own campaign coffers, and since it’s clear by now that Barack Obama plans to get himself elected first and worry about everybody else in the Democratic party when he feels like it, the DNC chair may be feeling the need for a little insurance.
And that’s where we’re at.  As LI’s William Jacobson put it, “The DNC Chair appears to have used DNC resources to reward two big donors with a job for their daughter.”  And… it’s a little depressing to contemplate how unsurprising that is, is it?  It also handily explains why the original comments didn’t prevent Ms. Gilbert from getting the job in the first place, too: they might have been too much if Gilbert hadn’t been Jewish herself, but as such said comments didn’t exactly stop the campaign cash from coming in, did they? – And that’s what it’s clearly all about for the Democratic party these days: keeping the campaign cash flowing.

Well, it’s not as if they have any ideals, principles, or coherent programs to run on at this point.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

PS: It’s not that it’s illegal; it’s not illegal.  It’s not even that it’s legal, really.  It’s that the people – who carefully made sure that it was legal – then presume to lecture the rest of us on ethics.

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Daily Links – April 4, 2012

Today is April 4th. On this date, in 1818, Congress adopted a plan that added five more stars to the American Flag, bringing the total to 20. It also permanently reduced the number of stripes to 13, in honor of the original colonies. Fans of the original practice of adding a star and a stripe for each state promptly started a Facebook page to protest and threatened to quit the flag altogether. Also on this date, in 1841, President William Henry Harrison died of pneumonia exactly one month after taking office, making his the shortest Presidency in U.S. history. He was also the first President to die in office, and it was widely believed he took ill following his delivery, in the cold and wet with no jacket, of the longest inaugural address in U.S. history at nearly two hours. Two. Hours. If Obama gave a two hour inaugural address, it would be everyone else who took ill and died. On this date in 1850, the City of Los Angeles was incorporated. This has made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move. (We miss you, Douglas Adams.) And finally, you’ll be happy to know that today is not National Tell A Lie Day. Consider this an Open Thread.

Bret Baier GRILLS Jay Carney | The Right Scoop
“Carney seeks to blame Republicans, but Baier won’t let him get away with it, citing both that Obama’s budget was voted on in the House (and unanimously failed) AND that the Senate won’t even put it up for a vote.”

Analysis: Obama’s Worst Speech Yet | Townhall
“Barack Obama managed to out-do himself by uncorking what very well may have been the most dishonest, demagogic, and bitterly partisan speech of his presidency.”

Hollywood exclusive just for FrackNation supporters | Frack Nation
“We can reveal that our research has discovered that Matt Damon has co-written and is about to star in an anti-fracking Hollywood blockbuster.”

Department Of Propaganda | Washington Free Beacon
“Labor Department Puts Up Leftist Motivational Posters At Taxpayer Expense”

Today’s Word of the Day comes via Dictionary.com.
sylph (silf): 1. A slender, graceful woman or girl. 2. (In folklore) one of a race of supernatural beings supposed to inhabit the air.

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My Favorite Easter

Today is my 39th Easter. And it will always be my favorite Easter.

I have had some blessed ones in the past. Childhood memories of Easter baskets, corsages for mom, Gospel tunes at church… Memories of the Easter Parade along Monument Avenue in Richmond, Virginia – Easter bonnets and a throwback to an older time…

I remember the many Easter weekends that coincide with the azaleas blooming and the playing of the Masters Tournament in Augusta, Georgia – in particular, I recall Bernhard Langer professing his faith in Jesus Christ upon winning his 2nd Green Jacket on Easter Sunday in 1993.

And more recently, I fondly remember going to Easter sunrise service at Arlington National Cemetery with my wife and great patriot friends in Washington, DC.

But this year, Easter takes on a more special meaning as I sit here with my wife, my 2 ½ year old son and my 1 year old daughter listening to old Gospel tunes (insert rant here about lousy, modern, non-descript “praise music” sung by pointy-glasses wearing, black pants wearing, open-collared shirt wearing hipsters… but I digress) before we head out for the day.

I have not written on RedState for a very long time – in large part because last year I was diagnosed with Cancer… Hodgkins Lymphoma, to be more specific. I spent many months going through treatment, including a promising trial drug. As of today, I have now had 3 clear scans and am in “clinical remission.”

Today is my favorite Easter, indeed. Praise God.

I praise Him for his many blessings – the love of my family and friends. The pure joy of having my son tell me he “loves me too much,” or my daughter looking at me with her big blue eyes and saying “Da.” I praise Him for a wife whose devotion to me through “sickness and health” reminds me what a real promise before God truly means.

I also Praise Him for freedom. The care that I received through modern advances in healthcare at MD Anderson was truly amazing. And it is the product of free markets… an imperfect system, to be sure. But it is the product of freedom, not the musing of an arrogant tyrant in Washington who believes the state should tell us what to do. The state can only tell us what to do if we let it.

Jesus taught us much about love, forgiveness and doing unto others. But Jesus also taught us a lot about hypocrites, false prophets and supposed leaders who are full of it.

This Easter, I am thankful for all I have but also all that I must continue to do to “fight the fight, finish the race and keep the faith.” (see 2 Timothy 4:7).

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