It would appear that Rep. Daniel Lungren is going to challenge House Minority Leader John Boehner for his leadership position. If Boehner is actually behind his party, he will do the right thing like Roy Blunt and step aside.
The thing that the GOP leadership needs to realize is that this election wasn't a referendum on Conservatism. A quick look at the number of state issues that went the way of conservatives should say that. What we should take away from the election is that it was a referendum on the direction that the Republican Party had taken.
I've been reading about Lungren, he's a moderate and much like Eric Cantor, who will replace Blunt, I'm not entirely sure that he is the man that the GOP needs in a leadership position at this point in history. However, if the last election has proven anything, it's that the current leadership should not remain in place, and certainly Lungren and Cantor could hardly do worse.
It's time for some fresh, new faces to lead the party out of the swamp that it's in. As I have said in my past blogs, there are a number of them out there who are rising to the top.
We've already seen some of the old guard do the right thing and get out of the way. Now it's time for Mr Boehner to do the same.
I've spent the last couple of days off my blog because I've been trying to parse all the information that has been coming out since the election and trying to decide how I feel about all this.
Don't get me wrong. I'm disappointed. I'm certainly worried for the future. It seems that Mr. Obama and the rest of the Democratic leadership, in spite of their word that they want to unite everyone and work toward bipartisanship, seem to be moving to the hard left. As I said in my last blog, it appears that Lieberman will be spanked for speaking out in favor of John McCain during the campaign. Also, the appointments for transitional teams do not bode well for future unity and bipartisanship -- that is unless you define bipartisan as the conservatives giving up all their beliefs and coming over to the liberal way of thinking.
Having said that, I'm happy. Why? Because I do see evidence that Obama will bring about the change we need. I doubt that it's the change he intended although it could be, since we don't really know what he actually meant when he said change, but I doubt it. The change I see is within the Republican party.
I actually see a future in the Republican party now. I fully think that the majority of the party's problem is that it had lost its way. Now I see the first light of a direction emerging, and it's a good one -- back to the conservative values that we need.
First of all, is the attempt to smear Sarah Palin. Unnamed staffers leaking stories about her and disparaging her to the media. Even CNN is saying that these stories are false. Read it here. It's fear. These people realize that they have lost and lost big. They realize that their plans have failed miserably and they're trying to put it off on one of the people who is the future of the party in an attempt to save their own skin. Thankfully people are seeing it for what it is and launching a campaign to thwart it. Michelle Malkin addresses Project Leper in detail.
I've heard interviews with defeated moderate Republican candidates who say that the problem has been that the party wasn't moderate enough. Really? You take a strategy the fell flat on its face and say that more of it would have been better?
The media are reporting the Palin smears and the words of the defeated Republicans like they're gospel. They know. Despite their best efforts, true conservatives are a threat to the leftism that they so love, and if we've learned from history, true conservatism wins.
You don't have to look far to see the future of the party. It's in Palin, Bobby Jindal, Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee and many others.
There's an energy out there. I know I'm part of it. I've always been a conservative like many people are religious. They go to church on holidays, say an occasional prayer and even talk like Christians. I've been the same way in my conservatism. I vote conservative, I'll even talk conservative sometimes, but I haven't really gotten out there to help. Until now. Now I'm going to get involved, I'm going to work on campaigns, I'll be donating, and I know I'm not the only one.
With the appointments he's made so far, it appears that Obama will make many of the same mistakes that Bill Clinton made in his first term that brought about the Contract With America and a turnover of congress. Combine that with the conservatives of the future and you have a recipe for success.
I see by the news tickers that tomorrow is set for the meeting in which Harry Reid will spank Joe Lieberman for supporting McCain in the Presidential election.
Lieberman holds two chairmanships in the Democratic Conference, Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. All of the major news outlets are reporting that Lieberman will most likely be stripped of at least his Homeland Security chair.
Last night, Reid said that the election is "not a mandate for a political party or an ideology." I think it would be pretty hypocritical for him to then punish someone for holding a different opinion on the election.
Lieberman has sided with the Dems on almost everything, except the war, and the election. Yet, a growing number of Democrats, while calling for unity and reaching across the aisle are also calling for Reid to punish Lieberman for his transgression in this race.
Both Obama and the congressional leadership have promised bipartisanship and unity. I don't know, maybe unity and bipartisanship are in the eyes of the beholder. If the Dems want to show that they are truly going to be their word and work to unite this country, this seems like a good place to start.
As I sat last night, lamenting McCain's loss and being concerned for our future, a coworker who is a Democrat pointed out to me that "We're all Americans" and said that we need to come together and unite behind our new President.
I was struck by this statement as I listened to President-elect Obama deliver his victory speech, talking about reaching across the aisle and working together and saying that he wants to unite everyone. What struck me was that I had heard those themes in a victory speech before, but it was different this time.
It was four years ago. Not long after Peter Jennings, with tears welling up in his eyes, announced that George W. Bush had been reelected, and Bush was making a victory speech with very much those same themes of reaching across the aisle and the people uniting.
The difference was that nobody was calling anyone a crook, nobody was talking about how if he hadn't stolen the election four years ago, he wouldn't have even been running this year. There was no demonization of the VP and other staffers. There was none of that, save a couple of people running by across the street from us yelling "Go Obama! F--k McCain!"
There were discussions of tax and various other policies and how much would Obama actually be able to get done once in the White House. There were discussions of the possiblity of different outcomes had the Republicans put up a different candidate, but there were no cries for investigations. There was nobody saying that he's not the President that he shouldn't be allowed to take office. There was no talk of him being a Nazi. There was none of that.
There was, however, repeated talk of the fact that it's been a long election, it's over now, it's official, he's won, and that we're all Americans and, because of that, we need to put aside our differences and unite behind our new President.
I wonder how things would have gone had there been more talk like that from Democrats in 2000 and 2004.
So, here we are on Monday morning before Election Day. The fat lady (sorry, caloricly enhanced) is off in the wings warming up her voice. The polls are not looking good for us at all. The polls have been starting to look better each day, unfortunately, I just don't think that there is enough time. The latest audio from Obama indicates that he would kill thousands of jobs and put the cost of turning on the lights in our homes out of sight. Give it a listen...
He did this interview in January. Where has this audio been all this time? I was listening to the radio this morning and one of the callers said that if this would have come out a couple of weeks earlier, Obama could not have carried Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Illinois, and other coal producing states. Last night, I was watching Hannity and Colmes, and they said the same thing.
This seems to be a theme about the McCain campaign for the last couple of weeks. The idea of "Why didn't we hear that a couple of weeks ago?" "Why hasn't the campaign been pounding this for the past couple of weeks?"
A couple of weeks ago, I was driving across Toledo and McCain was doing an interview with WSPD radio here in town. The host asked what he had to do to win and McCain went down a list of things that they needed to say and messages they needed to pound home. Throughout that list, I was pounding my steering wheel and screaming at my radio, "When you gonna start, JOHN?!!!!!"
We've gone back to "It's the economy, stupid," in this campaign. The facts are that the Democrats in Congress as well as Presidents Carter and Clinton and Barack Obama have their fingerprints all over the genesis of this economic crash. They were the ones who forced the subprime loans that started this thing. Presidents Carter and Clinton pushed it, Democrats in Congress including Pelosi, Dodd, and Frank forced it to be expanded in spite of protests from Republicans like John McCain. Even as late as July of this year, Barney Frank was saying that the system was fine and Fannie and Freddie were fine. Obama himself even brought a lawsuit against Citicorp to force Citibank to make more subprime loans. Yet, as late as last week I was at a speech by McCain and a speech by Palin and I heard nothing of this.
The Democratic run Congress has a 9 percent approval rating while Bush is holding an approval rating between 25 and 30. Yet you almost never heard the campaign putting Obama together with congressional leaders like the Democrats put McCain together with Bush.
A friend and I were talking late last week and I said that if a person set out to throw an election I don't think they could have done a better job than the McCain campaign did. Also from that conversation is a theory we have as to why you never really heard about the economy stuff. We're thinking that deep inside himself, McCain so dislikes Bush that he would rather leave Bush's legacy with the economic problems than put it where it goes, even if it means losing the election.
Here is my last plea to voters before the election...
Last night, I watched an economic analyst who said that neither candidate has a great economic policy at this point. Obama's policy, if not implemented just right, will cause a depression. McCain's policy, if not implemented just right, will cause runaway inflation. The potential problem comes in that there is a very real chance that Obama and the Democratic Congress will have nobody to slow them down. If McCain were to manage to pull off the miracle come from behind or the Republicans manage to stave off the Democratic supermajority in congress, we could probably keep this in check. Otherwise, there will be very little to slow down the oncoming depression.
I pray that tomorrow we manage to pull off something, be it stopping the Democratic supermajority, or putting a Republican in the White House, to keep the two party system alive, but I don't hold out much hope. Without one or the other, I see a very real dismantling of the things that made this country the greatest on earth.
The point to remember is that what the government gives it must first take away. --John S. Coleman
There are these two quotes from Obama and Biden have me flummoxed. I just can't understand how paying more in taxes makes you patriotic and wanting to pay less taxes makes you selfish...
There are any number of people who would disagree with those two statements. First would be the US Court system. There are two cites I feel are on point here...
1."Any one may so arrange his affairs that his taxes shall be as low as possible; he is not bound to choose that pattern which will best pay the Treasury; there is not even a patriotic duty to increase one's taxes." Helvering v. Gregory, 69 F.2d 809, 810 (2d Cir. 1934) (Hand, J. Learned), aff'd 293 U.S. 465, 55 S.Ct. 266.
2."As to the astuteness of taxpayers in ordering their affairs so as to minimize taxes, we have said that 'the very meaning of a line in the law is that you intentionally may go as close to it as you can if you do not pass it.' Superior Oil Co. v. Mississippi, 280 U.S. 390, 395-396, [50 S.Ct. 169].This is so because 'nobody owes any public duty to pay more than the law demands; taxes are enforced exactions, not voluntary contributions.'" Atlantic Coast Line v. Phillips, 332 U.S. 168, 172-173, 67 S.Ct. 1584, 1587 (1947) (Frankfurter, J.).
And as for selfishness, let's look at what Mr. Obama has given to charity in recent times...
Only when he started running for office did he actually start donating anything. One can only assume that's because he figured it would look bad to be making no donations as a candidate.
And Mr. Biden is even worse. Since 1998, he has made $2,450,042 and yet he has made total charitable contributions of $3,690. For those of you without a calculator, that works out to just over one-tenth of one percent!
I think the reason they want to take people's money and give it to others is because they figure everyone is like them and won't give anything unless forced.
The fact is that their plan just won't work. No country has ever taxed and spent itself into prosperity. Ever!
I think Winston Churchill said it best...
For a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle.
I had another thought regarding yesterday's blog about Palin being a heartbeat away from the Presidency. If Obama is elected, Joe Biden will be a heartbeat away from the Presidency. If you look at what he has said over the campaign, he is an absolute gaffe machine. He can't even stay consistent with the ticket's policy. The only difference is that the liberals who run the major media outlets do not want to hurt the campaign of their chosen candidate give him a pass on everything.
And as we go into the election with the potential of giving over complete control to a group of people who want to make the biggest government in history, I give you the words of Milton Friedman...
"If you put the Federal Government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in five years there will be a shortage of sand."
