Closing Ranks, Winning the Election

By Alan Caruba

I am surely not breaking any new ground by suggesting it is time for Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich to end their primary campaigns and to urge that the Republican Party close ranks behind Mitt Romney.

This needs to be said by anyone and everyone who wants to see Obama defeated in November.

It would be an act of patriotism for both men, Santorum and Gingrich, to end their campaigns. I make no mention of Ron Paul because he was always a sideshow.

In this week’s column, Ann Coulter spells out why Santorum is hardly worthy of support.

“Meanwhile, when he was in Congress, Santorum wouldn't even vote to eliminate federal funding for the National Endowment for the Arts. Santorum supported all sorts of big-government spending plans -- No Child Left Behind, prescription drug coverage for seniors and the "bridge to nowhere."


But you'd think we would at least have Santorum's vote against federal funding for pornographers and deviants. Alas, no.


The NEA, you will recall, uses federal taxpayer money to subsidize crucifixes submerged in urine, photos of bullwhips up a man's derriere, poems celebrating the Central Park jogger's rapists, photos of amputated human genitalia, vomit, mutilated corpses and dead fetuses. (And that was just the children's wing of the museum!)


But Rick Santorum voted against cutting funding for the NEA every time a vote was taken both as a representative and a senator -- in 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1997 and 1998. These weren't accidental votes. Each one was deemed a key conservative vote on which members of Congress would be graded by the American Conservative Union.”

I have long been on record in my support of Mitt Romney and my view that Newt is unqualified for as long a list of reasons as Coulter offers regarding Santorum.

Because they failed to receive the support of voters and secure funding, Michelle Bachman, Rick Perry, and Tim Pawlenty dropped out of the race what seems like an age ago.

Santorum continues and, in doing so, is saying things that make no sense even to those barely paying any attention to him at this point. He has never been in serious contention even in the few states where he has been credited with a win. The 2012 election will be won on the basis of economic, not social issues.

Newt’s percentages have been dismal, but Newt continues because he loves the spotlight and has a single deep-pockets financial backer that allows him to fly around recommending Moon colonies and other fanciful notions.

It is March 2012 and Republicans need to coalesce behind a single candidate, donate to him and the Party, volunteer, and do all the things necessary to defeat Obama. Otherwise, four years from now, if Obama is still President, he will be presiding over a nation whose exceptionalism, economy, and world power status will be a thing of the past.

© Alan Caruba, 2012

Who Will Be Mitt's VP Choice?

By Alan Caruba

It’s still early in the Republican primary season and Rick Santorum has done very well in the Midwest, so it is time to ask, who will be Mitt Romney’s vice president choice? Okay, so some of you are saying Mitt will not be the GOP choice, but play along with me just the same.

Newt Gingrich/Rep. Ron Paul: Neither of these candidates would be a good VP choice because Newt is currently self-destructing and said vicious things about Romney. Paul is essentially a political sideshow whose appeal is mostly to the young who are not famous for turning out to vote.

Sen. Rick Santorum: At this point Santorum would appear be a good choice because he did well in the Midwest, but he has been lackluster in the other primaries and the likelihood that he will win enough delegates before the Tampa convention is slim. He is a good campaigner and a genuine conservative.

Sen. Marco Rubio: He is a very appealing young man and is a leading Hispanic Republican, but he has a constitutional eligibility problem similar to Obama in that his parents were born in Cuba and does not qualify as a natural born citizen to be President. Democrats are not likely to raise this issue, but serious-minded Republicans would.

Gov. Mitch Daniels: The Governor of Indiana, like Santorum, would arguably draw Midwestern voters, but he is a low-key personality who is not likely to excite voters from the East and West Coasts. He has a good record of governance, but the presidential ticket is as much a popularity contest as a political one.

Rep. Paul Ryan: He’s another young man with real potential in the years ahead. In debates he could eviscerate Obamacare and explain complex economic issues, but Ryan is more valuable in his present role in Congress now and into the near future.

Gov. Haley Barbour of Mississippi is a good campaigner and would likely bring much of the South to support the ticket. He has one of the best political minds in the party which he formerly led, but it is likely that he would be seen as a man whose time has come and gone.

Gov. Sarah Palin: Been there, done that. She is far too polarizing despite her appeal to Tea Party voters. She did not prove that helpful to the McCain ticket and is “old news” so far as most voters are concerned.

Gov. Jeb Bush: This is kind of a wild card choice. He has an excellent record as former Governor of Florida, but he is a Bush and that might prove to be a drag on the ticket for many who mistakenly blame Bush43 for the 2008 financial crisis that occurred just before the end of his second term.

Donald Trump: He is another wild card and despite his endorsement of Romney, Trump is all about Trump and is not a politician. In a race that will involve lots of class warfare, his wealth would be a liability. Let him raise money and fire away at Obama from the sidelines.

This brings me to two choices that would animate the Republican presidential race in ways that would benefit the laid-back Romney.

Gov. Chris Christie: He is a dynamite campaigner with a short, but good record as Governor of New Jersey. He has a national reputation and wide appeal. He might, if offered, join the ticket.

Rep. Allen West: In my view, he would be an excellent choice. Charges of Republican racism would be rendered moot. He has a strong military background and is a solid conservative. In addition, he is a great campaigner and he too comes from Florida. He would bring some real dynamism to the ticket.

We already know that Joe Biden will remain on the Democratic ticket and, if that isn’t a liability, I do not know what is.

All this is, of course, pure speculation, but it is fun, isn’t it?

© Alan Caruba, 2012

The Looney Tunes Version of the GOP Campaigns

My favorite Looney Tunes Characters (c) Warner Brothers

By Alan Caruba

I have begun to think of the Republican campaign as a series of Looney Tunes cartoons being replayed again and again. They are filled with a combination of laughs and the fantastical, self-defeating violence of Wily Coyote trying to catch the Roadrunner

As the primary season moves along, I sometimes think that far too many Republicans have temporarily lost their minds. Three years of Barack Obama will do that to you.

My response to the campaign thus far may have something to do with the fact that, like Reagan and others, I was once a Democrat and, to borrow a phrase from Paul, First Corinthians, “When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things.”

These days, a lot of Republicans sound like a kid who sent Santa a list of toys he wanted and, even though he got most of them, he feels compelled to write and ask why he didn’t get all of them.

Granted that Republicans don’t have the most scintillating field of candidates, but most, including Donald Trump, have concluded that a guy that made millions as a successful venture capitalist, gave a couple of million away in charity just last year, has been a Governor, and hasn’t had a single hint of scandal in his life, might not be such a bad choice.

His opponents at this point include a guy who wants to start a Moon colony, is married to his third wife, left the Speaker’s position under a cloud of ethics impropriety, is given to saying genuinely bizarre and extremely nasty things with regularity, and would make the pathological narcissist in the White House look like a Boy Scout.

Another opponent—one whom nobody including himself—thinks could get elected seems to be in the race for the purpose of having one last hurrah, beating the drum for a few good ideas and a lot of really bad ones. Ron Paul has been in Congress since shortly after the last Ice Age ended and has sponsored only one bill that passed.

And, finally, there is Rick Santorum who is so infused with religious commitment that he reminds me of someone who was touted in a similar fashion, a former Sunday school teacher named Jimmy Carter. All the religion in the world cannot substitute for the steely-eyed realism a President requires in a world filled with evil counterparts.

It’s the voters, however, about whom I worry. New Hampshire was expected to endorse Romney, but in South Carolina Republicans there gave the nod to Gingrich. The Floridians came through with the unmistakable choice, based I am inclined to think on the many older and wiser citizens that live there though, in fact, he won all the demographic groups.

Ron Paul may be mildly amusing to some, but he cannot win. Santorum is a nice guy and, as the saying goes, nice guys finish last. And Newt Gingrich is like one of the Loony Tunes characters, the Tasmanian devil, going around wrecking the place and throwing bombshells that do nothing to advance the Republican and/or conservative agenda.

Too many Republicans appear to be waiting for a candidate who is perfection in every respect, political and personal, and in the real world few fit that description. America has had its shot at electing a “messiah” and it has turned out very badly.

As the rest of the primaries unwind, I anticipate that Mitt Romney will emerge as the party’s choice. I also expect a lot of pure nonsense about his being a Mormon, about the fact that he has not always hewed perfectly to conservative principles, and that he has—God forbid—actually changed his mind more than once or twice in the past.

Lost in all this blather is the fact that he is ideally prepared for the toughest job in the world and appears to have both feet planted firmly on the ground. I actually like the idea that he occasionally misspeaks, admits it, and then apologizes.

I hope that between now and the convention in Tampa, Republicans will regain their senses, their optimism, and their fighting spirit.

Rolling over for the worst President of the modern era because our candidate is not “perfect” is not an option.

Voting for a third party candidate is not an option.

Staying home on Election Day because “your guy” didn’t get the nomination is not an option.

The Republican compass has to point in only one direction and that is the resounding defeat of Barack Obama.

© Alan Caruba, 2012

America's Dark Mood

By Alan Caruba

It is possible for an entire nation to suffer depression? Not the financial, but the emotional kind.

I have not spoken to anyone, however, that has expressed any optimism about the state of the nation and the air is full of conspiracy theories regarding what new action Barack Obama might take. The most popular of these is that he will declare “a national emergency” in order to assert powers that would put him in control of the nation without reference or consultation with Congress.

I would have dismissed such a notion in the past, but Obama genuinely scares me and a lot of other people as well. An example of this was the great surge in gun sales that led up to Christmas. Guns are not generally regarded as the kind of gift you find under the Christmas tree unless you’re a hunter or shooting sportsman.

I cannot shake off the memory of the march on Washington in 2009 when an estimated million Americans gathered there to peacefully protest the pending passage of Obamacare. The President’s chief political advisor, David Axelrod, dismissed the gathering saying, “They’re wrong.” That’s beyond arrogance. It signals contempt for the way a democracy works.

They were not wrong and the Supreme Court has scheduled a hearing in March in response to 26 U.S. State Attorney Generals who filed suit to have Obamacare declared unconstitutional. The manner in which the then-Democrat controlled Congress forced the bill through to passage was scary, along with then-Speaker Pelosi’s statement that we just would have to read the bill “to find out what’s in it.” It was apparent that none of members of Congress who voted for it had bothered to do that.

What’s scary, too, is that Congress has provided the presidency with all manner of virtually dictatorial powers that were intended to be evoked only in the event of a major, national crisis. Even following 9/11 these powers were not used to hamper news coverage, freedom of travel, and other aspects of our lives. 9/11, however, was followed by the Patriot Act and many of us continue to have grave misgivings about some of its provision.

A more recent piece of legislation that permits the President to authorize the seizure, arrest and imprisonment of anyone deemed an enemy of the state is scarier still. Obama says he would not use such powers but modern history is filled with examples of dictators that did.

So, yes, America is in a very dark mood these days. New Hampshire’s citizens are poised to vote for a Republican to be that party’s candidate for the presidency. Adopted in 1945, at the end of World War Two, New Hampshire’s state motto is “Live free or die.” It is my hope that other Americans feel the same way.

Suffice to say that Barack Hussein Obama is not like any other President in the history of the nation. It is more than a little frightening that this unknown quantity was so carefully “packaged” that, along with a mainstream media that were literally enthralled with him, enough voters were found to elect him.

A lot of those voters were young and likely unaware of U.S. history, the Constitution, and the principles by which the nation is intended to be governed. A lot of those young voters, now a bit older, looking for jobs that don’t exist, living at home still, and perhaps also saddled with huge college loan debt may not vote at all or vote for anyone but Obama.

The other group that was instrumental in his victory was African-Americans and one wonders if a majority among them have had a change of heart. I doubt it. A third group was union members and the civil service unions and others have benefited greatly from his Administration despite growing opposition at the state level.

It is worth keeping in mind that there is a hard core of 25% to 30% of voters who are blindly liberal and utterly immune to facts or reality. The “Occupy” movement drew from this group and they quickly wore out their welcome wherever they gathered. If enough liberals are disheartened by their personal situation, they too may not turn out in large numbers to vote.

As for the GOP, it has become fractionalized by its libertarian segment, its evangelical Christian segment, and by what was a cohesive Tea Party conservative segment. They need to set aside their differences to elect a candidate who can defeat Obama and I am inclined to believe that the closer we get to Election Day, they will.

As with any depression, one has to shake it off and find ways to turn dark moods in to bright tomorrows. That’s America’s job. We have done it in the past and we can do it again.

© Alan Caruba, 2012

Media Whips Up Phony Iowa Primary Frenzy

By Alan Caruba

We are, once again, witnessing what the media does best, whipping up a public frenzy over an event or, in the present case, the primary elections they are seeking to influence.

The most current example is the forthcoming Iowa caucuses and, as Michael Barone noted in a December 27 Wall Street Journal commentary, Iowa is hardly a bellwether predicting who will be the Republican nominee to oppose Barack Obama.

In “As Iowa Goes, So Goes Iowa” Barone, a respected political analyst, noted that “the Hawkeye State has voted for the eventual Republican candidate only twice—in 1996 for Bob Dole, in 2000 for George W. Bush—and only once was the Iowa winner elected president.”

You would not know that from the 24/7 election coverage of the cable news channels, nor the print media coverage. For Republicans, the greatest concern is that a literal handful of Iowans might vote for Rep. Ron Paul who is to the left of Barack Obama on most issues.

For my part I have tried to ignore Ron Paul as much as possible, but he is getting the full media treatment, including an appearance on Jay Leno’s Tonight Show. The views he expresses are pure lunacy. He supports legalizing drugs, shrinking the military, isolationism, and all manner of policies that would incalculably harm the nation.

The whole primary process, along with the many debates, is intended to winnow out the weakest candidates. Tim Pawlenty and Herman Cain are already gone. After the Iowa caucuses, no doubt Michele Bachmann, Rick Santorum and Jon Huntsman will cease to be serious contenders. Rick Perry has proven himself to be a good governor, but a poor national candidate. Newt Gingrich is waning under close examination.

Mitt Romney is beginning to look like a paragon of experience and rationality.

Insofar as the national media catapulted Barack Obama into the White House, we need to be especially wary of the media’s enthusiasms for one candidate or the other and, at this stage, its “horse race” mentality.

Elections are a study of mass movements, the gathering of supporters coalescing around a particular candidate, and they say much about the national mood.

If the polls are any indication, Obama’s consistently falling approval numbers, despite the occasional blip, suggest that most voters with the exception of diehard liberals are deserting him after three years of crippling national debt, continued high unemployment, flatlining housing prices, his war on energy and the states struggling to deal with illegal immigration. Even liberal news media are pulling back from the adoring coverage he once generated.

Years ago in the 1950s a blue collar philosopher, Eric Hoffer, penned a book, “The True Believer”, that became a national bestseller. Hoffer had devoured the works of great thinkers as he rode the rails during the Depression years, worked in the fields, and became a longshoreman.

Hoffer’s book, still in print, had some insights regarding mass movements that are well worth revisiting. It was written in response to the likes of Hitler and Stalin, but it holds true for the current enthusiasms of Ron Paul’s supporters and those who cling to Obama’s myths.

Well before Obama’s vacuous offer of “hope and change”, Hoffer wrote, “For the hopeful can draw strength from the most ridiculous sources of power—a slogan, a word, a button. No faith is potent unless it is also faith in the future; unless it has a millennial component”, i.e., a hoped-for period of happiness, peace, prosperity, and justice. Obama has not delivered on any of these.

“Every established mass movement has its distant hope, its brand of dope to dull the impatience of the masses and reconcile them with their lot in life.” Americans, however, may be the most impatient people on Earth.

The utter failure of the Obama administration and the wreckage it has left in its path quickly mobilized a leaderless movement called the Tea Party. Its rejection of Obamacare and other administration policies and programs is the background music to the battle in Congress between those advocating the failed programs of the Democratic Party and the large contingent of newly-minted Tea Party-supported Republicans is evidence of a mass movement that the media continues to disparage.

Even those who do not identify themselves as Tea Party patriots will play an important role in the 2012 elections. Their power is revealed in the Democratic Party’s announcement that it will not seek votes from white, middle class working people, but concentrate instead on those on the government dole, union members, and those who want the status quo.

A national election is an exercise in propaganda, but Hoffer noted that “The truth seems to be that
propaganda on its own cannot force its way into unwilling minds; neither can it inculcate something wholly new; nor can it keep people persuaded once they have ceased to believe.” That is Obama’s dilemma and downfall. His endless speeches fall on deaf ears these days and will in 2012.

The 2012 elections will not be decided, nor even influenced by the outcome of the Iowa caucuses. For that we need to watch New Hampshire on January 10, South Carolina on January 21, and most especially, Florida on January 31.

We need more faith in a future without Barack Obama; one that is barely a year away.

We need more faith in the U.S. Constitution and continue to demand that it be obeyed.

We need more faith in our communal past. Hoffer wrote, “It was not the irony of history that the undesired in the countries of Europe should have crossed an ocean to build a new world on this continent. Only they could do it.” America continues to be a work in progress.

Pay no heed to the media’s arrogance, wedded to failed socialist programs. Pay no heed to Ron Paul’s lunacy. Pay no heed to Obama’s lies. We shall win through to a restored America.

© Alan Caruba, 2011

"What Were They Thinking?"

By Alan Caruba

The thing I fear most right now is having to write a column about the Republican Party in late November 2012 with the title, “What Were They Thinking?”

Let’s put it this way. No incumbent President since Jimmy Carter has had worse polling numbers than Barack Hussein Obama.

The question—the fear—on the minds of most Republicans these days is whether the Party intends to commit political suicide by choosing the wrong candidate to run against Obama and to add to their present agony, it has a litter of candidates who run the gamut from charisma-challenged to scarily brilliant.

Let’s review the choices.

Jon Huntsman, a former Governor of Utah, is in the race I’m convinced only because he harbors a deep animus for Mitt Romney, a former Governor of Massachusetts and fellow Mormon. Oh? You didn’t notice we have not one, but two, Mormons running? We do. No matter. Huntsman has so far managed to keep his tinfoil hat hidden in a box in the trunk of his car. Fortunately and wisely virtually no one is paying him any attention.

Then there’s Michele Bachmann. Frankly, I don’t want to have to listen to Nanny Michele for four years telling me to clean my plate because there are starving children somewhere in the world. She gained notice leading the Tea Partiers against Obamacare. Good for her. Now please return to the House of Representatives and leave us alone.

Rick Santorum is a very nice fellow and that’s his problem. He’s too nice. He doesn’t scare me or anyone else. In a dangerous world, I want a President who just might blow the hell out of some nation or other. He’s stuck on the abortion issue when the majority of Americans have, for better or worse, moved on.

The Cain Train officially derailed on Saturday, Nov. 4, and saved us from having to further give him any serious attention. I don’t much care that a bunch of dubious women claimed he was a sex fiend. I do care that Herman couldn’t find Ecuador or Chad on the map if his life depended on it. He had no experience working with a legislature or in politics except for losing one race in Georgia. He was and is extraordinarily unqualified to be the President of the United States

It pains me to say this because I love Texans and have many friends who live there, but Governor Rick Perry is not ready for prime time. Granted that Texas is big enough to be a small nation, most people outside of Texas are unaware that its legislature meets in regular session on the second Tuesday in January of each odd-numbered year for a session that is limited to 140 calendar days! Perry is charming and fairly bright, but even I could run Texas by drinking heavily for 140 days every other year.

I will not even linger over Ron Paul because he is a Libertarian and widely believed to have come from another planet. Paul gives “old”, “cantankerous” and “opinionated” whole new meanings when you put those words together in a sentence.

In March of this year I wrote about “the Newt-ster” saying that Newt Gingrich “intellectually, is head and shoulders above anyone else in the race. In terms of pure brain power, he has a real grasp of most issues.” Gingrich has a grasp of every side of every issue because, at one time or another, he has been on it. If, however, you had heard him speak to the Polk County Republican Party in Iowa last week you would know he would wipe the floor with Obama in a debate. For all his flaws—and who does not have flaws—he has an historian’s and working politician’s grasp of issues, big and small. Do I agree with him on all of them? No, but I think he could make the changes needed to turn the nation around and I believe he has a passionate love of America.

Which leaves us with Mitt Romney; old sure-and-steady, a man who has had the political misfortune of actually changing his mind over the years, largely because he ran as a Republican in one of the most Democratic States of the Union…and won!

Romney is an attractive, intelligent, and very well qualified candidate, having succeeded in the worlds of politics and business. Let’s also give him points for having lived a moral life as a good husband and father. He has made it this far without a single major gaffe, but Romney increasingly gives the impression of being robotic. He is locked into his political gameplan and talking points, and it has worked to this point. It may get him the nomination.

Of the two, Gingrich is just more fun to listen to as he speaks extemporaneously, citing Jefferson and Lincoln, quoting the Declaration of Independence, reminding us why the first Americans fought a Revolution. Gingrich has already made some history of his own, wresting control of Congress away from the Democratic Party in the mid-1990s. He could do it again.

The Republican Party made a spectacular mistake in 2008 when they choose John McCain. I think the Iowa primary will give Gingrich a win. I think the New Hampshire primary will give Romney a win. After that, money—lots of it—and organization will make the difference.

What matters above all other considerations is that the Republican Party must have a candidate who can send Obama packing. If that happens, America’s future will begin to improve in the late evening of November 6 when the election results come in.

© Alan Caruba, 2011

Global Warming and GOP Politics

By Alan Caruba

Here’s a handy guide to the campaigns to be the Republican candidate in 2012. Any effort to advance the “global warming” hoax, discredited since 2009 when it was revealed that the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change computer models were all rigged, should disqualify a candidate from serious consideration.

Texas Governor Rick Perry is already well ahead of his GOP competitors for the nomination and has actually passed President Obama in a recent poll regarding the voter’s choice in 2012. Much of this can be attributed to his attack on Obama’s failure to stimulate job creation, but his position doubting “global warming” is a contributing factor.

Rep. Michelle Bachmann has also voiced doubts about “global warming”, but it is former Gov. Mitt Romney who is likely to be the biggest loser on the topic.

It is comical that former Vice President Al Gore, the face of the “global warming” fraud, chimed in back in June to endorse Romney’s “global warming” position. He praised Romney for not heeding, according to Politico.com, “right-wing calls to reject the science behind climate change.” There is no valid science behind “global warming” and never was. Climate change is something that has been on-going for the last 4.5 billion years of the Earth’s existence.

The great Flip-Flopper, Romney will prove the biggest loser. At an August town hall meeting in New Hampshire he was asked whether he believed that “global warming” was real and he responded by saying he didn’t know. “Do I think the world’s getting hotter,” he asked rhetorically. “Yeah, I don’t know that but I think it is”, adding that “I don’t know if it’s mostly caused by humans.”

He doesn't know much on the subject, does he? Well, Mitt, here's a tip, the Earth has been in a perfectly natural cooling cycle since 1998. Suffice to say, humans have nothing to do with its climate and it should be worrying that Romney doesn’t know this.

Worse yet, Romney said “I think it’s important for us to reduce our emissions of pollutants and greenhouse gases that may well be significant contributors to the climate change and global warming you’re seeing.” Wrong on all counts!

Jon Huntsman, a former governor of Utah and Obama appointee as ambassador to China, is also in the GOP race, though most Republicans are probably unaware of this. He recently tweated that, “To be clear, I believe in evolution and trust scientists on global warming. Call me crazy. Okay, Jon, you’re crazy. To be this massively uninformed and misinformed at this date rules you out of consideration.

I do not know the other fading GOP candidates’ position on “global warming”, but I suspect most of them, if they want any chance to capture the nomination, will flee from suggesting there is a shred of truth to it. At least I hope so.

It should be a factor in the GOP choice because the “global warming” hoax has been the cause of legislative initiatives that have cost Americans billions over the course of many years.

As for President Obama, we know all too well that he has been in the tank for “global warming” along with most environmental claims. For a multiplicity of reasons, he has to GO.

© Alan Caruba, 2011

Washington's Magical Thinking

By Alan Caruba

The term, “magical thinking”, has been around a while to describe what individuals do to cope with the vicissitudes of life. I, for example, regularly buy a Mega Millions lottery ticket in the hope of winning when, logically, rationally, I know the odds are millions to one of that ever happening.

Magical thinking can be found in all aspects of life and it is surely magical thinking that caused America’s politicians, starting back around the turn of the last century, to believe that a really big government could take care of everyone when, prior to that, self reliance, support from the family structure, and hard work were the early guiding principles.

Indeed, the U.S. Constitution is testimony to the Founding Father’s intense distrust of a centralized government—hence checks and balances—and the fallibility of individuals entrusted with power over others. It turns out they were right because now there is no aspect of our lives into which government does not intrude.

A lot of this can be traced to the rise of Communism, the handiwork of Karl Marx, and its adaptation into Socialism, a modified form. In 1917 Russia had Communism imposed on it during the Bolshevik Revolution as the antidote to the rule of the czars. In time it utterly failed, but few have taken a lesson from that. It wreaked havoc and death on Russians for over seventy years.

Indeed, throughout the last century, wars were required to defeat various forms of totalitarian rule. Even the Peoples Republic of China eventually embraced its own form of Capitalism while retaining power in the hands of a centralized government.

Communism is a kind of magical thinking based on collectivism that always seems to come back to a handful of men ruling by coercion.

In 1908, the Socialist Party nominated Eugene V. Debs to run for president. A dedicated unionist, Debs had studied Marxism while in jail. What he believed then is still prevalent today. “When I joined the Socialist Party,” said Debs in accepting the nomination, “I was taught that the wish of the individual was subordinate to the party will, and that when the party commanded it was my duty to obey.”

“I am not satisfied with things as they are,” said Debs, “and I know that no matter what administration is in power, even were it a Socialist administration, there will be no material change in the condition of the people until we have a new social system based upon the mutual economic interests of the people; until you and I and all of us collectively own those things that we collectively need and use.” Debs was soundly defeated.

The election of Franklin D. Roosevelt, however, brought socialism to its zenith of power in America. He remained in office from 1933 until his death in 1945. Social Security is collectivism. Medicare and Medicaid is collectivism. Government “make work” programs are collectivism.

A government that owns an auto company is collectivism. A government that can shut down oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico is collectivism. A government that decides how much mileage the car you buy must achieve is collectivism. A government that thwarts the building of new utilities to meet the needs of a growing population and then instructs people to reduce their use of electricity is collectivism.

And a government that believes it can continue to borrow and borrow and borrow from the rest of the world to maintain sixty percent of its annual budget for “entitlement programs” is engaged in magical thinking.

It is magical thinking to believe that the same ratings organizations, Moody’s and Standard and Poor’s, should be trusted. They both granted top grades to the “government entities”, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which plunged the nation into a huge financial crisis. Indeed, the rating organizations never saw the implosion of Wall Street institutions coming until billions in public funds were needed to keep a complete collapse from occurring.

Spending more to get out of debt is magical thinking and yet that is the only “plan” the Democrats and the President offer the public. A July 25 Wall Street Journal editorial, “Toying with Default”, provided an insight to this saying, “Here’s a number for the debt history books: Mr. Obama’s final offer in the Biden talks was a $2 billion cut in 2012 discretionary spending. The federal government spends more than $10 billion a day.”

At a time when European nations are imposing major austerity programs, the Republican Party is charged with having to save the nation from a Democrat Party that has reluctantly concluded that a reduction in spending is necessary and increase in taxes is not achievable..

As a nation, if we are to survive, we must disengage ourselves from a century of “progressive” programs that are not based in reality. Debts must be paid. Entitlement programs must be revised and eventually abandoned. Government must be reduced in size and scope. Private enterprise must be set free to function and thrive.

Earlier generations fought a Revolution to free ourselves from the British monarchy and parliament. Earlier generations fought a Civil War to preserve the Union. A present-day older generation of Americans fought two major wars against totalitarian governments and lesser ones in Korea, Vietnam, and most recently in Iraq.

The present generation of Americans must empower Republicans in Congress to save the nation from the errors of the past, the wild spending, and the confiscatory effort to “transform” the nation into a collectivist society that mirrors failed “progressive”, Communist and Socialist thinking and programs.

© Alan Caruba, 2011

Republican Russian Roulette

By Alan Caruba

I have a friend who thinks the ghost of Bob Dole is stalking the Republican Party and Dole isn’t even dead! What he means, of course, is that, at this point, the present batch of candidates are not that inspiring. The Party needs to articulate a distinct, conservative agenda and have the guts to stick with it.

For the record, Dole ran with President Gerald Ford as his vice presidential choice and together they lost to Jimmy Carter in 1976. Later he ran as the GOP candidate for president in 1996 and lost to Bill Clinton.

The latest example of the GOP’s knack for second string candidates is Newt Gingrich.who is a former Speaker of the House. While he was president Bill Clinton ran circles around Newt.

Newt’s most recognizable characteristic is to seek accommodation with opponents of his political views. Instead of staking out a definitive conservation platform, Newt has always been too eager to "get along" with the opposition—shades of John McCain who also lost a campaign to be president.

A patsy, Newt is the smartest kid in the school who no one wants on their team. In essence, he has abandoned Republican issues in his quest for the presidency and forgotten that he is a Republican who is expected to oppose Obamacare, avoid talking nonsense about the environment, and not adopt the rest of the liberal agenda.

Republican voters are hungry for someone who unabashedly opposes the size of the federal government, the billions it borrows and wastes every day, the funding of Planned Parenthood, and comparable issues. They want to build a great big fence on our Southern border. They want us to drill for our own oil.

The flurry of interest that Donald Trump evoked came simply from his willingness to yell at President Obama loud enough to get him to put out another phony birth certificate. Only the hopelessly naïve thought he would actually run.

Conversely, everyone expected Mitt Romney to run, but instead of shedding the millstone of Romneycare, he defended it! It’s a flip of the coin as to who has flip-flopped more on issues, Romney or Obama. Still, if you were a movie director casting the role of president, wouldn’t you pick Romney?

Masseurs Santorum and Pawlenty suffer the Dole/McCain problem. They give all the right, safe answers, but they are not loudly sounding the alarms about four more years of Obama. Ron Paul is trotting out his mixture of good and bizarre notions. If he’s a “serious” candidate, it is only for the lonely Libertarians longing to legalize marijuana and bring Muslim combatants to justice after reading them their Miranda Rights.

Rumor says Michelle Bachmann will get into the race and, having had Sarah Palin on the ticket in the last election, one might think that Republican enthusiasm for a woman candidate might have waned by now. Bachmann’s smart and articulate. She can’t win the White House.

By contrast, a virtual unknown non-politician, Herman Cain, is making a very good initial showing.

Of course, Jon Huntsman, former governor of Utah and ambassador to China, would be every Democrat’s choice as a Republican President if for no other reason than he joined that former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Western Climate Initiative, chasing the illusive global warming and advocating taxes on carbon dioxide emissions. Fortunately for the other candidates, he’s hired John McCain’s former campaign geniuses to craft his campaign. Can you spell l-o-s-e-r?

What Republicans have not noticed is that President Obama has rather neatly fulfilled nearly the entire agenda bequeathed to him by George W. Bush while, at the same time, blaming him for the Recession and everything else.

This isn’t “triangulation.” It is the wholesale absorbing of the other Party’s platform in an era when it is very difficult to tell the two parties apart. Obama is going to have to kill a whole bunch of al Qaeda big shots to keep his poll numbers from falling any further.

If this keeps up Republican political consultants will be praying the economy will be so bad by November 2012 that only crazed Dem-a-robots will vote for Obama, along with the teacher’s and other unions. To them, add 95% of the black vote and 80% of the Hispanics.

If independents decide to stay home, Obama could win. They won't. The Tea Party folk have not gone away.

My bet is that 2012 is like 2010 when the House changed hands. It could just be a total blowout and all the agonizing over the current crop of GOP candidates will seem silly in retrospect.

© Alan Caruba, 2011

Who the Hell is Reince Priebus?

By Alan Caruba

Okay, we have had two years of the token black man as the chairman of the Republican National Committee and it’s goodbye Michael Steele. Thanks for whatever, but the party’s broke and still has to raise a ton of cash for the 2012 elections. Bring in the white guy, Reince Priebus.

Reince Priebus? Who the hell is Reince Priebus? Well, for one thing he is the new RNC chairman. A former GOP leader in Wisconsin where the citizens were so totally fed up with the Democrats they voted in a score of Republicans. Priebus could and did take credit for it. Some say it was largely the Tea Party movement in Wisconsin that was responsible, but a win is a win.

Inside the Beltway Priebus is referred to as a “nuts and bolts” guy, another way of saying his job is to raise the money the RNC needs. Given that the Democrat candidate in 2012 will be Barack Hussein Obama that is not likely to be a problem.

I just sent the Republican National Committee my annual $25 contribution and my reward to be to get a call every two weeks for the rest of the year from the RNC asking for more. Believe it or not, I actually stop being unbelievably polite after the seventh or eighth call. No, really.

Of course, it is hardly my contribution that matters at this point. The real question is whether Wall Street will embrace the Republican Party and start backing whoever emerges as the GOP presidential candidate, along with the others.

As far as Wall Street is concerned it’s all about “access” to whoever might win and, aside from disliking Obama even more than he dislikes them, Wall Street has examined the tea (party) leaves and concluded Obama is, as the kids say, so over.

Beyond the money crowd there’s the business crowd and they have zero reason to back Obama unless they are solar panel and wind turbine manufacturers. Corporate America, with the exception of General Electric, is just sick of Obama and all the uncertainty he has created for them.

Obama and the Democrats have only two constituencies on which they can depend in 2012. One is the unions and the other is Afro-Americans. The Dems have a solid lock on the 25% to 30% of Americans who are so liberal they wish Obama, in addition to being black, was gay, a cross-dresser, trans-gendered, and a card-carrying member of the Communist Party of the USA.

Back to Priebus; in addition to having to raise a boatload of cash for the GOP, he has to worry about who gets selected to be its 2012 presidential candidate. His job is to remain neutral, but I’m betting he’s hoping it’s not the Great Straddler, Mitt Romney, capable of bestriding both sides of any issue.

The other reoccurring nightmare for Priebus is Sarah Palin. The Momma Grizzly says the right things for meat-eating, gun-shooting, fish-clubbing Republicans most of the time, but she would never get elected President.

Americans have tried electing a “novelty” with Obama and now they want a nice, old white man, but not too old as in John McCain. McCain spent so much time “crossing the aisle” they never knew where to seat him during a State of the Union speech.

There are, at this point, just way too many Republicans who want to be President and we shall have to wait for one of them to catch fire and ignite Republican passions.

In the end, it will be INDEPENDENTS who will defeat Obama in 2012 and elect, well, someone-anyone else.

I suppose, at this point, it doesn’t matter who Reince Priebus is unless he turns out to be as prone to making goofy public gaffs as the departing Michael Steele. If he does, all bets are off.

© Alan Caruba, 2011

Election Fatigue

By Alan Caruba

It’s a lot like the marathon experience of “hitting the wall” when you have to push on to get to the finish line. It’s election fatigue.

Elections give media news people hundreds of hours to speculate, to evaluate, to discuss what is occurring in every district of every State, to report which candidate is ahead or behind, to trot out a new poll every day, until those who have probably made up their mind long before refuse to listen to another word.

There are, of course, thousands of words that follow an election and it must be said that the 2010 midterms were quite literally historic. As Karl Rove noted, “Tuesday’s election was epic. Republicans gained over 60 seats in the House and six in the Senate. They’ll now occupy eight additional governor’s mansions and at least 500 more seats in state legislatures.”

“The Republicans picked up more House seats than in any election since 1938, leaving the Democrats with the smallest number in the House since 1946,” and, predicted Rove, “Democratic losses could get worse in the next election. In 2012, three times as many Senate Democrats as Republicans face the voters—and many are from red states. Two more years of voting for the Obama agenda could do them in.”

The question in the minds of most Americans is how does all this translate into solving the awesome problems facing the nation and, more particularly, what does it mean to my future?

Everyone is going to have a different answer to the latter question because everyone has their own specific circumstances. I would not, for example, want to be a new college graduate right about now. The likelihood is they will be moving back in with mom and dad while others will be struggling to hold onto their homes.

While it is likely that the Bush tax cuts will remain, the temptation of States like California and other big spenders to raise taxes exists. The great challenge of our times is to shrink government at every level to an affordable size. Something is very wrong when the largest union in the nation is for government workers. It is inherently wrong that this union can give money to candidates when that money comes from members being paid with public funding.

The answer to the former question, the personal impact the post-midterm nation will have, involves the potential for a huge inflation, a continued devaluation of the U.S. dollar, a stagnant employment prospect as few jobs are created, and for some the prospect of being laid off from work or running out of the funds put aside or invested for retirement.

Real reduction of government is needed, but few believe it will occur. We have a bloated federal government workforce, many of whom are earning twice what a comparable private sector job would pay. There are entire federal departments and agencies that could be pared without being missed.

There are some important policy changes that could significantly improve the job sector and the mythical “energy independence” politicians love to talk about. You don’t just poke a hole in the ground and get oil. It takes time. Involves a lot of risk, and it takes lots of money.

Big Oil is in the business of risk and would spend the money if it was permitted to drill in and offshore of Alaska where vast amounts of oil are known to exist. There’s oil in the Dakotas and there’s oil in the Gulf of Mexico where the Obama administration is deliberately rendering thousands unemployed by slowing the permitting process. When you think oil, also think natural gas. The oil companies are as interested in it as crude.

Let’s stop handing out billions in tax credits and other funding for “Green energy”, wind and solar power. Few projects are more stupid than a proposal to build the world’s largest solar-thermal power plant in the Southern California desert. It just got the green light (no pun intended) from the Obama administration to the tune of $6 billion.

While the Greens are always screaming bloody murder about endangered species and the destruction of “pristine” land, this one project will take up 7,025 acres of federally owned land near Blythe, California. The cost of the transmission lines that will be needed is ridiculous when a single coal-fired or nuclear plant could produce many times more dependable, 24/7 megawatts of electricity than this blanket of solar panels ever will.

Barack Obama is still talking about a fictitious and fraudulent “climate change”, i.e., global warming at a time when most of the world has concluded that there is no global warming and when the largest carbon credit exchange in the U.S. just closed its doors.

Therein lies the real problem. Granted that the election has been a blow against the Obama agenda, Barack Obama is not Bill Clinton who moved to the center after his midterm losses.

Obama is a very different animal. He is still capable of doing a lot of harm from the Oval Office and, as we have seen, he is not shy about doing it. This is an administration that added $2.7 trillion to the national debt, including a record $1.4 trillion deficit for fiscal year 2009 and a $1.3 trillion deficit for FY 2010.

That’s why we must shake off election fatigue and be as relentless in the two years ahead as those through which we have passed. Obama is punishing America because he doesn’t like America.

He must be politically neutralized. It won’t be pretty.

© Alan Caruba, 2010

Caruba's Crystal Ball: The 2012 GOP Presidential Nominee

By Alan Caruba

If the Republican Party nominates a RINO (Republican in Name Only) like John McCain in 2012 it will lose and, assuming the Democratic Party clings to its suicide pact with Barack Hussein Obama, he will win.

It is doubtful that Obama will not be re-nominated for the 2012 race. As the Wall Street Journal’s Kimberley A. Strassel pointed out, “History doesn’t inspire optimism. Over the past 100 years, every time a president two years into his first term lost Congress, he went on to be re-elected: Truman in ’48, Eisenhower in ’56, Clinton in ’96.”

What we do know is that independent voters will decide whoever will be elected in 2012. There were no Tea Parties in those earlier elections and a lot depends on what the GOP does over the course of the next two years. While they control the House, they have limited options beyond a declared intention to repeal Obamacare, cut government spending, etc. Twenty-three very nervous Democrat Senators up for election in 2012 may prove cooperative. Obama will not.

So, let the speculation begin! Rasmussen Reports polled likely primary voters to find out who Republicans favored at this early point and released a November 4 announcement that three ex-governors, Mitt Romney of Massachusetts, Mike Huckabee of Arkansas, and Sarah Palin were in a dead heat.

My crystal ball says that none of these politicians will be on the ticket.

Romney is a RINO who brought an early version of Obamacare to Massachusetts when he was governor. Huckabee plays well on television and should stay there. Palin has a cult following, but is a political anomaly who could be defeated in a general election.

Many Republican women candidates did not fare well in the midterms. None of these early potential candidates should be considered serious contenders for the presidency at a time when many Republicans are looking for new faces, not failed earlier contenders.

Others to ignore in this category include Governors Bobby Jindal and Haley Barbour, as well as Tim Pawlenty. All are good governors, but none have the star power it takes to be president.

There are Republicans who are already making appearances in Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and other early primary states and, of these, Mike Pence, an Indiana Representative who won a recent presidential straw vote at a “values summit” in September looks like a viable contender. There’s some buzz for John Thune, a handsome Senator from South Dakota, but Thune has not geared up for the campaign and few voters know anything about him.

Marco Rubio, the newly elected Senator from Florida, is a bright young, articulate face of the new GOP, but he needs to get a full term under his belt before running. He needs his name on some piece of legislation that gains attention. He is, for sure, a rising star.

Newt Gingrich may want to be president, but he is likely to conclude that being the party’s “elder statesman” is the role in which he is most comfortable. I do not think he will run for the nomination. For all his virtues, Gingrich is no Ronald Reagan.

The 2010 midterm elections were unique in that they were all about rejecting Obama’s actions in his first two years and the growing suspicion that he is a few cards short of a full deck. He can be depended upon to pursue the same policies that led to his rejection.

It is worth noting the way even some Republicans in Congress who had been there a long time got swept from office and the way some people with no political resume were elected. A “wave” election, the midterms were also in many ways an anomaly or, as Wall Street would call it, a correction.

My crystal ball tells me that the Republican Party could likely embrace Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey.

A lot depends on whether Christie will campaign for the presidency and he seems determined to serve out his first time. In two years he will look even better having already demonstrated that his endorsement is golden and he is a great campaigner whom audiences love. One day after the midterm elections, the respected political pundit, Stuart Rothenberg, addressed a group of D.C. insiders His pick? Gov. Chris Christie.

Gov. Christie says he wants to stay in New Jersey to address its need to reduce its burden of debt and shake loose the civil service union’s grip, but few serious politicians can or would ignore their party’s call to run for the presidency. Gov. Christie has enormous personal appeal on many levels and just the right values for a large segment of independent voters who have demonstrated they want to “clean house” in D.C.

One mistake the Republican Party must not make is the expectation that it can “co-op” the Tea Party. The GOP needs to cooperate and be responsive to it. It’s not a third party. It is a movement.

While potential candidates begin to maneuver for a shot to be the Republican Party choice, I think the time for the familiar faces has passed and the demand for real change based on rediscovered conservative values favors a new face.

© Alan Caruba, 2010

Kill Obamacare Now!

By Alan Caruba

Should the Republicans meet with President Obama to discuss their proposals for the reform of healthcare legislation?

No!

As with everything else involved with Obama, the meeting on Thursday is pure political theatre. It has nothing whatever to do with compromise or changes in his proposed healthcare reform.

The Republicans should not be intimidated into believing that failure to meet with the President will paint them as obstructionists. They are in office for purpose of obstructing this legislative monstrosity and the Senate’s Harry Reid has made it clear he intends to pass any bill that the House sends. Speaker Pelosi has said as much too.

Speaker Pelosi, however, is presiding over a House in which many of its Democrat members are in full flight from Obamacare, knowing that a vote for it is a vote to be defeated in the November midterm elections. Looking across to the Senate, they know that Scott Brown (R-MA) was elected primarily for his opposition to Obamacare.

The bill can be defeated in the House and should be. A bit of history: the Constitution was written to facilitate a slower process of legislating so that bills could be reviewed, debated, and responded to in a fashion that reflected the PEOPLE’S preferences. The Founders knew that any government that could pass anything it wanted at warp speed would swiftly plunder and exhaust the treasury as well as run after every fad that came along.

Since the financial crisis in late 2008, the White House and Congress has functioned on the basis of government-by-crisis.

If restoring stability to the banking sector (the TARP bill) wasn’t enough, the Obama administration told Americans that General Motors and Chrysler had to be saved rather than permitted to go into bankruptcy and be restructured. Then Americans were told that billions had to be borrowed and spent to “stimulate” jobs. All of these bills were passed too swiftly for serious analysis and rebuttal.

On February 17th syndicated columnist and radio personality Hugh Hewitt wrote: “When the GOP lost control of the House and Senate, the annual budget deficit was $161 billion. When President Obama’s budget for next year—with no stimulus and no TARP—calls for $1.6 trillion in red ink.”

What the nation needs is congressional gridlock to ensure that this continued rape of the treasury and our future is stopped.

If the Tea Party movement tells us anything, it is that millions of Americans want a return to the strict interpretation and obedience to the Constitution, and to the principles of fiscal prudence, small government, and a strong defense.

The Republican Party has a chance to demonstrate that by boycotting Thursday’s meeting about Obamacare. They need to stand in front of the microphones and cameras and tell people that their healthcare reform proposals were presented weeks ago to President Obama and that he continues to lie to Americans by suggesting he has not seen or read them.

If the GOP fails to meet this challenge, they will find themselves up against third party candidates that will doom them to minority status in the next election and possibly others to come.

They have the party apparatus to win. What they need now is the courage to oppose the Democrats and President Obama until they can regain control of the Senate and House.

© Alan Caruba, 2010

Saint Sarah of Wasilla

By Alan Caruba

Every time I see Sarah Palin, I think of the total population of Alaska which, according to the 2010 World Almanac is 686,293 citizens. Anchorage’s population is 279,243..

Then I think of the many other U.S. cities that have populations that exceed the entire population of Alaska. They include Austin, Texas, Charlotte, North Carolina, Columbus, Ohio, and San Jose, California, to name just a few.

There are mayors throughout the U.S. that deal with problems of far greater magnitude than the former Governor of Alaska and former candidate for Vice President of the United States of America ever encountered.

I may well be the only conservative in America who thought John McCain was out of his mind when he chose then-Governor Palin to be his running mate in the 2008 campaign. The last person to choose a woman running mate was Walter Mondale, Jimmy Carter’s Vice President, who in 1984 was soundly defeated by Ronald Reagan.

I do not think America is ready for a woman president. I will leave it to the political scientists to argue whether Sarah helped or hurt the McCain campaign because, in my view, most of the damage was self-inflicted by Senator Maverick.

I confess, I have never been keen on women in political office. It is a prejudice of which I am not particularly proud, but one need only cast an eye on the likes of California’s Nancy Pelosi, Barbara Boxer, and Diane Feinstein to find common ground with Burt Prelutsky, a fellow commentator, who says they remind him of the three witches in the opening scene of Macbeth.

There are many other women in Congress and most of the time when I see or hear one, I keep wishing they had stayed home to raise a family or run a flower shop or some other business than the nation’s business.

None of this is politically correct, but I’m not here to offer pabulum.

I watched Palin’s $100,000 address to the Tea Party conference in Nashville and could not shake the notion that it was 98% pure clichés. This is not to say that the attendees weren’t the best kind of patriots America could hope for, but it is to say that Palin has very little to offer other than to wave the flag, mention Reagan a lot, and tease President Obama.

That didn’t keep the audience from giving her many rounds of applause and even, at one point, to shout “Run, Sarah, run.” No, please do not run, even though we both know you have to dangle that prospect in order to remain a viable political figure.

Part of my problem with Palin is that she resigned from the last political job she had. No doubt the rising costs of all the nonsense lawsuits brought against her played a role in that decision. The prospect of cashing in on her sudden celebrity and popularity was no doubt a factor as well. I daresay it may have been the best decision to make at the time.

The Palin conundrum is this: she is pretty much the lone voice of the conservative movement; articulating its fundamental values of self-reliance and responsibility, smaller government, and a strong defense. Almost alone among the Republican Party’s spokespersons, Palin plainly says we are at war with al Qaeda.

Even though I am in agreement with her, whenever I see her I cannot shake the same feeling I get while watching a circus act, akin to fire eaters or sword swallowers; briefly entertaining, but quite forgettable.

For the present, Palin offers the Republican Party a “personality” to carry the flag until someone like the new Senator from Massachusetts, Scott Brown, develops a national following or some other new faces emerge from the 2010 midterm elections.

With few exceptions, male Republican office holders tend to be fairly colorless policy wonks and pinstripe-suited folk who have the right answers, but not the theatrical skills to evoke much enthusiasm from a wary and weary electorate.

At some point, however, Sarah needs to return to Alaska…and stay there.

Ga-Ga for Sarah

By Alan Caruba

As we know from the 2008 campaign, every so often Americans go ga-ga over some politician. A relatively slim majority of the voters were convinced that Barack Obama was the first or second coming of a great new future filled with “change”; all of which has turned out for the worst.

The inexplicable choice of Sarah Palin as John McCain’s vice presidential running mate instantly conferred fame on the now-former Governor of Alaska and brought out all the attack dogs of the media. I was instantly reminded of the Geraldine Ferraro fiasco when Walter Mondale selected her as his running mate in 1984.

At this point, Palin embodies all the discontent of a vast body of Americans who believe that the nation has lost touch with conservative principles of fiscal prudence, a strong national defense, and smaller government.

Since there are currently few Republicans in high office that can be considered front-runners in 2012, Palin gives party loyalists someone in whom they can invest their hope in the short run, if not as a candidate herself, at least as a spokesperson for the values they share.

It was fairly obvious throughout the campaign that Palin was not well-schooled in foreign affairs issues, although her strong suit was clearly energy issues due to her role in Alaska’s oil-rich good fortune. She is perhaps a quick learner and could yet master the myriad of things a national leader has to know in order to demonstrate competence.

Her fairly swift rise to high office in Alaska appears to have been powered by dissatisfaction with corrupt state politicians who had disappointed Alaskans sufficiently to take a chance on a fresh new face and voice. In office, she took on the oil interests and rid the state of wasteful spending. It should be noted, however, that the World Almanac puts Alaska’s population as of 2007 at 683,478 people. Most U.S. cities have larger populations.

I think Tina Fey’s Saturday Nigh Live depiction of Sarah Palin resonated with viewers for both its remarkable physical similarity and its clear suggestion that she too often appeared clueless during the campaign.

That was then and this is now. And now there is the soaring bestseller status of her book and the promotional tour that is intended to sell even more while establishing her as a significant voice for conservatives in general and Republicans in particular.

She is, in many ways, a media phenomenon and that includes most of the media that still abhors her, the remainder that wants to exploit her for ratings and circulation, and the few that want to provide her with a legitimate platform to express her views.

These days, Geraldine Ferraro, a Democrat, is called upon to occasionally comment on matters deemed appropriate for a former vice presidential candidate, a former Congresswoman, and a kind of political freak of nature.

Once the uproar over Palin’s book subsides, this is likely to be her role in life as well; a female Republican office-holder plucked from relative obscurity for whatever reasons John McCain had at the time.

The success of Palin’s book will help pay the enormous legal bills she and her husband faced as the result of malicious suits brought against her, all of which have ended in failure to find any wrongdoing. Her speaking fees will provide her family with a lifestyle that she has earned by being tough enough to meet the extraordinary challenges with which her political and personal life has presented her.

Beyond that, I do not see her reentering the political scene by running for Senator from Alaska, for its Governor again, or any other position, least of all the presidency. I think she will continue to evolve into a spokesperson for values and principles that many Americans share, but which are being eroded by a full scale attack by the Obama administration.

So, let’s all go ga-ga for Sarah for a little while and let’s hope she will eviscerate Barack Obama with the same gusto she hunted moose.

The Elections: A Turning Point, Swiftly Reached

By Alan Caruba

The November 3rd elections were a turning point, swiftly reached.

The inauguration of Barack Hussein Obama was followed by Tea Parties around the nation that aggregated into the huge September 12 rally in Washington, D.C. And barely two months later, the election of Republican governors in Virginia and New Jersey. In Maine, the voters repealed the authorization of same-sex marriage, an anathema as morally debased as abortion.

My mind went back to Barry Goldwater’s acceptance speech at the Republican convention in 1964. “I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. And let me remind you that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.”

That speech was given when communism, led by the Soviet Union, was challenging freedom around the world. Lyndon Johnson who had assumed office upon the assassination of John F. Kennedy had initiated the “Great Society”, a government program that was the welfare state on steroids. A war was raging in Vietnam. The civil rights movement was gaining momentum.

“This is the Republican Party, a Party for free men, not for blind followers, and not for conformists,” said Goldwater.

Barely ten months after the inauguration of Barack Obama, the blinders had fallen from the eyes of his followers and others beguiled by his oratory, his promise of change that proved itself to be the takeover of the economic foundations of the nation, and his weakness in the face of a world filled with the enemies of freedom.

In 1964, Goldwater said, “We Republicans seek a government that attends to its inherent responsibilities of maintaining a stable monetary and fiscal climate, encouraging a free and competitive economy and enforcing law and order.”

Today, thanks to a profligate Congress controlled by the Democrat Party since 2006, the economy is in shambles, a free and competitive economy is under attack by massive government programs intended to control one sixth of it, the destruction of private property, and borders that remain unprotected against those who would take advantage of benefits intended for our citizens while destroying their lives with illegal drugs.

“I know this freedom is not the fruit of every soil,” said Goldwater. “I know that our own freedom was achieved through centuries, by unremitting efforts by brave and wise men. I know the road to freedom is a long and a challenging road. I know also that some men may walk away from it, that some men resist challenge, accepting the false security of government paternalism.”

To read that 1964 Goldwater speech is to be astonished by its prescience and to be inspired by its faithfulness to the fundamental values of what it means to be an American.

That Americanism filled the street of Washington, D.C. and will do so again for as long as it takes to defeat “amnesty”, to defeat an apologetic and weak President schooled in the tenets of communism and dedicated to a government in complete control of our lives.

Goldwater could have been speaking of Afghanistan when he said “We are at war in Vietnam. And yet the President, who is Commander-in-Chief of our forces, refuses to say, refuses to say, mind you, whether or not the objective over there is victory.”

What followed in the wake of Johnson’s election and the subsequent terms of Richard Nixon was the death of some 53,000 young Americans sent into a war where victory remained beyond grasp because of weak leadership, of moderation, and the misjudgment of the enemy’s devotion to the cause of communism.

Today, the nation faces the horror of a nuclear-armed Iran and the determination of al Qaeda to destroy us.

Americans recoiled from Obama’s world tour of apologies for being the world’s beacon of freedom and protector of the peace. “We here in America can keep the peace only if we remain vigilant and only if we remain strong,” said Goldwater.

“Those who seek to live your lives for you, to take your liberties in return for relieving you of yours, those who elevate the state and downgrade the citizen must see ultimately a world in which earthly power can be substituted for divine will, and this nation was founded upon the rejection of that notion and upon the acceptance of God as the author of freedom.”

A president awarded a Nobel Peace Prize for no discernable reason has discovered a world filled with the enemies of peace and of freedom. He could well have been the subject of Goldwater’s call to Republicans and lovers of freedom.

“It is the further cause of Republicanism to restore a clear understanding of the tyranny of man over man in the world at large. It is our cause to dispel the foggy thinking which avoids hard decisions in the illusion that a world of conflict will somehow mysteriously resolve itself into a world of harmony, if we just don’t rock the boat or irritate the forces of aggression…and this is hogwash.”

A turning point has been reached. Americans will not accept the erosion of their constitutionally guaranteed freedoms, will not accept an all-powerful federal government interposing itself between them and their physicians, will not except the taxation of energy use, and will not accept the “hogwash” of a world we’re told will yield to the soothing charade of diplomacy in the face of naked aggression.

To refresh and renew your dedication to freedom, read Barry Goldwater’s speech, as fresh today as when it was delivered:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/daily/may98/goldwaterspeech.htm

A Very American Distrust

By Alan Caruba

Barack Obama has crashed headlong into a wall of distrust. If he had any understanding of American history he would know why, but his sole interest is himself and he proved that by writing not one, but two memoirs.

The men who waged the American Revolution and then met in secret to write the U.S. Constitution all shared a distrust of government. They understood government was necessary, but they wanted to keep a federal government small and ensure that most powers resided in the individual states and in “the people.”

For most of American history, the federal government was small. Its main function was to maintain armies and navies to protect its sovereignty and its commercial interests. Early presidents encouraged the exploration of the continent and its populating by the many discontents who arrived seeking a better life than the Old World could or would provide.

America promised the intoxicating opportunity to be free to make a life for oneself that had few restraints so long as one did not break the law, honored one’s contracts, and took part in the process of debating issues and electing representatives. This necessity to rise above family bonds and other allegiances to participate in the affairs of one’s community, one’s state, and one’s nation has been the glue that has kept generations of old and new Americans connected.

George Washington and other former revolutionaries were most fearful of what he called “factions” and what we now call political parties, but it didn’t take long for such parties to emerge because it is the nature of men to come together around commonly held beliefs.

The wonder is that, despite serious differences on how the nation should be run, the parties traded power back and forth, new presidents were elected without rebellions (other than the Civil War!), and the conduct of the people’s business progressed smoothly. Some policies worked. Others did not. Pragmatism was and is the order of the day.

What people understood in the early years of the republic was that government was not intended, nor expected to take care of them from cradle to grave. The Constitution is an enumeration of the many things government is not supposed to do. The process by which legislation gets passed is deliberately slow so people have the time to be heard.

President Obama has come smack up against a very American tradition and attitude. It is the distrust of a central government or, for that matter, any government. Obama arrived in the highest office in the land understandably convinced that his gift of oratory would provide a smooth road toward his goals. His party had solid control of the Congress…or so they thought.

To the degree that his campaign was a remarkably successful charade intended to hide his lack of any real experience to be President and to hide his true intentions, one can understand why Obama now feels buffeted by the system that has served Americans well since 1776.

Americans do not want to turn an excellent health system over to the government and especially to a government that was not been able to function well in the wake of a monster hurricane; a government whose existing Medicare and Medicaid programs are not only insolvent, but have $36 trillion in unfunded liabilities; a U.S. Postal Service that lost $7 billion last year; and Amtrak that has never shown a profit since it was created in 1970.

All the smoke and mirrors of the campaign have been replaced by the reality that the President and the Congress work for US. We decide the kind of programs We want and We discard those that don’t work. We may be equal before the law, but that’s where it ends. Those that work hard expect to enjoy the benefits of that work and resent those who live parasitically off of them.

The days of infinite borrowing and spending are over. Both political parties share blame, but the party whose principles have always been about fiscal prudence will benefit most in the coming elections.

The national spending spree is over. Everybody knows this except Obama and the Democrats in Congress.

Sarah! Sarah! Sarah!

By Alan Caruba

Sarah Palin’s stunning announcement on July 3rd that she would step down as Governor of Alaska at the end of the month left all the political pundits gazing into their crystal ball desperately looking for an explanation.

The most obvious answer was the one she offered. She had done as much as she thought she could do for Alaska and now she wanted some time with her family. We are conditioned to never believe what politicians tell us and, in most cases, that is the wisest thing, but Palin breaks the mold in many ways.

The first thing everyone wants to know is whether she will run for President? She is enormously popular with many rank and file Republicans, but probably not with the power brokers within the party. She is, unlike John McCain, a true “maverick” because she actually believes in the major tenets of conservatism, limited government, strong defense, and fiscal prudence.

The GOP has long since strayed from those Reaganesque values and there is no better recent example than George W. Bush. For the life of me, I still have no idea how McCain got the nomination and things got really bizarre when he plucked Palin out of the wilds of Alaska and near total obscurity.

She was, after all, a woman. The last time a presidential candidate selected a woman as his running mate was Walter Mondale who chose Geraldine Ferraro and that turned out to be a Democrat disaster. What was McCain thinking? Of course, that’s what Republicans keep asking no matter what McCain says or does as he seems like some kind of stealth Democrat most of the time.

Palin was an instant hit; a sudden political superstar and, at the same time, also a candidate in over her head when it came to a national election. The press quickly lampooned her as a Moose-shooting rube from the only state less far away from the lower 48 than Hawaii. Even so, she was dynamite on the stump. And she still draws large, enthusiastic crowds to the consternation of Democrats and some Republicans.

Palin suffered from one of the worst political campaigns in recent memory. McCain had no central message, few new ideas, and poor delivery whether delivering a speech or in an interview. The man was painful to watch. He looked old. He sounded old. The contrast with his young running mate made some think the wrong person was on the top of the ticket running for president.

Palin was, by virtually any political standard, unique. Plain-speaking, possessed of a photogenic family and with personal, religious, and political values that rang true with a lot of people who sensed she was the real deal as a conservative.

She also did not appear to have much depth when it came to the major issues challenging the nation. She tended to speak in clichés and still does.

She brought out the very worst in Democrats/liberals. I cannot recall when a candidate was so viciously attacked. The mainstream media parachuted reporters into Wasilla, Alaska in a desperate effort to find anything bad to say about her. On Saturday Night Live, a devastating satirical portrait by Tina Fey turned her into a joke; someone who “could see Russia” from her front porch.

If the GOP could bottle whatever it is she does that drives liberals like New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd insane, we could begin to win some elections again. Citing another hit job, a profile by Todd Purdum in Vanity Fair, Dowd notes that some regard Palin as suffering from narcissistic personality disorder, but clearly has not noticed any evidence of this in President Obama.

So why did she quit and what will she do now? I think the girl from Wasilla wants some time with her family while she and they are still young. She has five children and one grandchild. They are Track, Trig, Bristol, Willow and Piper. Unwed, teenage Bristol is the mother of Tripp. This is definitely not the Brady Bunch.

She probably also needs time away from the horrid attacks. I don’t think most of us give much thought to the toll such savagery takes on a public figure. She surely has done nothing to deserve it other than to become a rising star among a fairly dull Republican roster of potential presidential candidates.

Larry Kudlow, the columnist and radio host with a brilliant take on economic issues, thinks she is the new head of the Republican Party and I think he may be right.

And, finally, I keep thinking she would really like to take off the gloves and tear into Barack Hussein Obama. The Alaskan Governor’s office is not the right place to do that. Combine that will a quarter million in legal expenses to defend against spurious charges, and the reason for leaving early seems fairly obvious.

She needs a bigger platform and her new freedom gives her one.

The President becomes more vulnerable to serious criticism with every passing day and, so far, Republicans have been too quiet. Palin is likely to do politically to Obama what she has already done to a Moose.