Foreign Countries

Britain - Christianity - Conservatives - Constitution - Democrats/Leftists - Education - Freedom - Liberals - Patriotism - President - Religion - Rights - Society/Culture - State Government - The Law - Warner Todd Huston - Western Civilization

ISI Conference Part Two: Christ in Our Soul

November 16, 2009 by 4 Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

This is part two of my three part report on the Intercollegiate Studies Institute’s one day conference on The Roots of American Order. So here is part two of mine titled Lift a Glass to the Past: America Rooted in Tradition or a New Covenant? (Part one can be seen here)

The second speaker of the day was Brad Birzer who regaled us on America’s Judeo-Christian History.

Bizer began his session by noting that historian Donald Lutz discovered that the founders used Christian references in their pre-war writing far more than any other source. St. Paul was the most referenced New Testament figure with Micah 4:4 being the most referenced Old Testament verse.

But they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree; and none shall make them afraid: for the mouth of the LORD of hosts hath spoken it.

On this Lutz quotation, though, I want to clarify something. Many have bandied about the claim that Donald Lutz said that 34 percent of the founder’s writing contain direct Biblical citations. This claim is not altogether true. On the other hand, it is not something to quickly dismiss as fans of the Enlightenment influence want to do, either.
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ISI Conference Part Two: Christ in Our Soul”

Britain - Chicago - Christianity - Conservatives - Constitution - Democrats/Leftists - Education - History - Liberals - Patriotism - Religion - Rights - Society/Culture - The Law - Warner Todd Huston - Western Civilization

Lift a Glass to the Past: America Rooted in Tradition or a New Covenant?

November 16, 2009 by 8 Comments

-By Warner Todd Huston

Is the United States a grand experiment, a new covenant invented out of whole cloth by the fertile minds of the founders from never before seen ideas or is it a nation spawned from deeply rooted traditions of western thought? This was the question posited in a one-day-long conference on classicism in America’s founding sponsored by the Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI) and held in Skokie, Illinois, a near northern suburb of Chicago.

The short answer is that the liberal mindset that holds that we should invent the USA anew with each succeeding generation is an erroneous conception of what the United States was meant to be when it was founded. Sure America has some ideas never before seen by political man, but at heart, America is rationalism informed by tradition, not some amorphous mélange of constantly changing ideas.

The founders created a new nation based heavily on Western ideas through British tradition, not one based solely on rationalist thinking. As they struggled to set their new nation on its new Constitutional course, for instance, the words of Founder John Dickinson of Delaware served as their benchmark.

Let experience be our only guide. Reason may lead us astray.

An intimate crowd of 60 some participants enjoyed four separate addresses by lecturers associated with ISI. Appearing behind the lectern were Bruce Thornton, Professor of Classics at Fresno State University; Brad Birzer, Professor of History at Hillsdale College; Mark C. Henrie, Senior VP and Chief Academic Officer of ISI; and E. Christian Kopff, Professor of Classics at the University of Colorado, Boulder.

In these three installments, I will lay out what we talked about at this interesting one-day conference.

Part One: How it all Began
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Lift a Glass to the Past: America Rooted in Tradition or a New Covenant?”

Ann "Babe" Huggett - Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - China - Communism - Security/Safety - Socialism - Society/Culture

Burning Man Obama Is A Flaming Shame

November 14, 2009 by

-By Ann “Babe” Huggett

U.S. President Barack Obama is scheduled to arrive in Beijing, China on Sunday, November 15 and in preparation for the event, Chinese artist Liu Bolin constructed and then set alight his eerily evocative “Burning Man Obama” sculpture which he claims represents Obama’s worldwide influence.
Showing his admiration, Liu Bolin said, “Obama is a very interesting and perspective leader. He is so hot now that I decided to impress this in “Burning Man Obama” work. Yes, setting something on fire can have negative connotations, but this piece represents energy and life that Obama has given to the world. We’re eager to see what he can do for China and U.S. relations.”
Made of bronze and modeled after an Obama Time Magazine “Man of the Year” cover, the statue is peppered with tiny holes for gas flames which engulf the statue giving it a nightmarish and satanic look unintended by the artist.

Fiery flames are one of the “Twelve Symbols” found on Chinese Imperial robes. It represents the Summer Solstice and the renewable energy of the emperor himself. However, the main impression of the work is one of unintended consequences. Because it deals with a controversial political figure both at home and abroad, it speaks immediately to the viewer’s own political orientation.

In other words, Bolin’s work is very much like Obama himself in that it is a blank slate on which to write one’s own perceptions. It doesn’t elevate the viewer like great art but relies on the shock value of an uncontrolled, undisciplined energy. It confirms the viewer’s own primal orientation towards fire, not as a source of light and energy as represented by contained symbolism inherent within candles, oil lamps or halos of spiritual enlightenment, but as an out-of-control, destructive, consuming beast gobbling up the very person it seeks to honor.
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Burning Man Obama Is A Flaming Shame”

Afghanistan - Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Democrats/Leftists - Dr. Don Boys - Islam - Islamofascism - Liberals - Military - Religion - Republicans - Security/Safety - Society/Culture - Terrorism - Western Civilization

Fanatic Muslims Are the Enemy: Investigate All Leaders!

November 14, 2009 by

-By Don Boys, Ph.D.

After a Muslim army officer killed 13 fellow-solders and wounded 33 others at Ft. Hood, Texas, it is time for sane, sensible, and stalwart officials to dump political correctness and recognize that Muslims who adhere precisely to the Koran are the enemies of freedom. The shooter believes that he is a Muslim first which means like all faithful Muslims he must make the nation where he lives an Islamic nation with shirah law. In a lecture to other medical doctors, he declared, according to the London Telegraph, that “non-believers should be beheaded and have boiling oil poured down their throats.”

Sooner or later, informed, incensed, and indignant Americans will demand that officials stop playing “Let’s stop the terrorists” and stop the terrorists, at least those here at home. When a mushroom cloud forms over an American city, Obama’s pandering to Muslims will be discarded as quickly as long johns in a Texas heat wave. However, it will be too little, too late and he will be known as the most incompetent U.S. Presidents.

As always, the authorities refused to suggest religious motives for the Ft. Hood killings. Surely it was depression, dandruff, or poor potty training that caused a soldier to turn against his fellow soldiers with two guns blazing. Question: Would I be considered cranky or only crass or cruel to suggest that his statement “Allah is Great” (in Arabic) just before opening fire might, might be an indication of his motive? And could those 72 green-eyed virgins Islam promises to all “believers” who die as they take out “infidels” be somehow involved?

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Fanatic Muslims Are the Enemy: Investigate All Leaders!”

Afghanistan - Anti-Americanism - Democrats/Leftists - Islam - Islamofascism - Liberals - Military - Religion - Society/Culture - Terrorism - Warner Todd Huston - Western Civilization

Newsweek: Nidal Hasan, It’s Not Islam, It’s a ‘Military on the Brink’

November 9, 2009 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Andrew Bast of Newsweek thinks he’s got the real reason behind Major Nidal Hasan’s murderously criminal rampage at Fort Hood last Thursday. Could it be that Hasan was steadily radicalized and steeped in hateful Islamofascism? Could it be a jihad mindset that sent Hasan into that military clinic yelling Allahu Akbar as he shot at anyone that got in his way?

Nope. Ridiculously, it was a “military on the brink,” it was the “stress” an uncaring U.S. military is forcing upon its members that was at fault as far as Bast is concerned. This is his obtuse conclusion in Newsweek’s piece headlined, “Is Fort Hood a Harbinger? Nidal Malik Hasan May Be a Symptom of a Military on the Brink.”

Ominously, Bast begins with his worry that there could be more members of the military about to follow Hasan’s murderous example. Bast absurdly starts his piece with this: “What if Thursday’s atrocious slaughter at Fort Hood only signals that the worst is yet to come?” And why would it be a sing that “the worst is yet to come,” you might wonder? Why else but that all that “stress” the military is putting everyone under is about to cause the whole combined services to explode?
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Newsweek: Nidal Hasan, It’s Not Islam, It’s a ‘Military on the Brink’”

Afghanistan - Barack Obama - Capitalism - Congress - Constitution - Democrats/Leftists - Free Trade - Health - House of Representatives - Joe Wilson - Liberals - Senate - Society/Culture - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

Rep. Joe Wilson on Healthcare and Afghanistan

November 9, 2009 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Does Joe Wilson or any of his colleagues on the Hill care about the Constitution?

I participated in a conference call last Friday with Representative Joe Wilson (R, SC) who wanted to rally the troops against Pelosi’s healthcare bill. He also talked of Afghanistan, as well. But I think he made a revealing comment about the Constitution that distresses me.

Rep. Wilson started off his comments with his condolences to the families of the victims of the criminal actions at Fort Hood which had only recently happened at the time. “As a 21-year veteran of the military myself with three sons in the Army, one in the Navy, and a nephew in the Air Force, I truly do have a deep sympathy for the families at Fort Hood,” Wilson said.

Wilson then went into the issues of the day and said he was pleased to see the “clean sweep” that Republicans in Virginia saw in the governor’s race there.

This has also been an extraordinary week with the elections on Tuesday in the state of my ancestors, Virginia. I’m so grateful for the Commonwealth that there was a clean sweep and as it pointed out to me the Republican clean sweep there was for limited government and extending freedom is in the tradition of Thomas Jefferson.

Wilson also remarked that Jon Corzine, the incumbent Dem. gov. in New Jersey, had some “pretty strong things to say about me” and was happy that he lost his re-election bid.
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Rep. Joe Wilson on Healthcare and Afghanistan”

Communism - Democrats/Leftists - Europe - History - Security/Safety - Socialism - Society/Culture - Warner Todd Huston

The Happiest of Anniversaries: 20 Yrs. Since Berlin Wall Fell

November 9, 2009 by

It was 20 years ago when one of the most prominent symbols of tyranny finally fell. The storied Berlin Wall that separate East from West Germany, raised to tyrannize a populace controlled by East German communists. For decades no one ever expected that oppressive barrier to ever fall, but fall it did at long last.

So, let us remember that day Nov. 9, 1989, when tyranny was defeated.

9/11 - Afghanistan - Anti-Americanism - Chicago - Cook County - Crime - Democrats/Leftists - Guns - Illinois - Islam - Islamofascism - Liberals - Palestinians - Religion - Society/Culture - Terrorism - Warner Todd Huston

Two (Actually Three) From Illinois Murdered by Muslim Madman

November 7, 2009 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Two Illinois soldiers lost their lives from the evil, criminal actions of Muslim Nidal Hasan in Texas last week.

Private Francheska Velez, 21, of West Kamerling was one of the thirteen killed by Hasan at Fort Hood Army base on Thursday.

“She was the best I have. The light of my family,” Juan Velez said of his only daughter. “She was living my dream — to be part of the military, part of the United States. To be part of something. Just to give back to the United States because this is where we are from.”

Pvt. Valez was three months pregnant when she lost her life.

Also killed by this terrorist was Pvt. Michael Pearson, 21, of Bolingbrook. Pearson was training to become a bomb technician.

Screaming “Allahu Akbar,” terrorist Hasan entered a medical clinic where soldiers were waiting medical exams for deployment and began to fire at anyone in his way. 13 were murdered — actually 14 counting the baby in Velez’ womb. And therein lies a problem with the reporting of this story. No one mentions the loss of life suffered by Valez’ baby! It should not so easily be forgotten.

We have said a prayer for the families of victims and the tortured soul of this murdering Muslim terrorist.
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Two (Actually Three) From Illinois Murdered by Muslim Madman”

Afghanistan - Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Crime - Democrats/Leftists - Guns - Islam - Islamofascism - Journalism - Liberals - Media Bias - Palestinians - President - Race - Religion - Security/Safety - Society/Culture - Terrorism - Warner Todd Huston

Mass Murdering Muslim Major Worked to Assist Obama’s Transition Team Through University Project

November 6, 2009 by 1 Comment

-By Warner Todd Huston

Plus, Ron Reagan couples “tea baggers” with Murderer Nidal Hasan.

In 2008 The George Washington University Homeland Security Institute (HSPI) initiated a transition task force to help craft homeland security policies during Obama’s transition period. In May of 2009 HSPI finished its report titled, “Thinking Anew-Security Priorities for the Next Administration.” One of the members of this Obama transition project was none other than the Muslim murderer Nidal Hassan.

Nidal is listed in Appendix C, Page 29 of the HSPI report as having served as a “Task Force Event Participant,” in his position with the Uniformed Services University School of Medicine. (download .pdf of report) We should caution, though, that Hasan did not work for Obama. But he was a part of the University’s efforts to advise Obama.

The HSPI fashions itself a “think and do tank” and claims its mission as that of building “bridges between theory and practice to advance homeland security through an interdisciplinary approach.” I wonder if one of those bridges leads to “understanding” the mindset of terrorists like Hasan, a participant in George Washington University’s “think and do” mission?

There is also video of Hasan participating at the GWU event.

So what of Obama? Why he’s still trying to understand this “tragic shooting.” Hours after the murderous rampage concluded, Obama made some rather facile comments after his jaunty opening remarks to members of America’s “First Nations” consisting of a long list of special “shout outs” to participants there.
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Mass Murdering Muslim Major Worked to Assist Obama’s Transition Team Through University Project”

Ann "Babe" Huggett - Britain - Democrats/Leftists - Elections - Europe - Liberals - Socialism - Society/Culture

Who would you rather have with you as a back-up in that dark alley?

November 5, 2009 by

-By Ann “Babe” Huggett

London’s flamboyant, bike-commuting mayor, Boris Johnson, did something rather extraordinary earlier this week in that criminal paradise known as the UK where self-defense and “have-a-go heroes” face prosecution for stopping crimes before the police can get there purposely too late in order to just have to fill out paperwork. In the UK, where everyone basically quails before the whims of the violent, Boris Johnson confronted a gang of teenage girls (one armed with an iron bar), who were threatening an older woman.

With his reputation as an out-of-control rugby player still hanging around him like a miasma, big, burly Johnson sped up on his bike to help the founder of the environmentalist 10:10 campaign and film director, Franny Armstrong (The Age of Stupid) as the wolf pack of girls descended on her. The girls, not used to meeting resistance from anyone, dropped their weapon and fled.

Armstrong, who was a supporter of Johnson’s mayoral rival, “Red” Ken Livingston, was clearly impressed when she said, “If you find yourself down a dark alleyway and in trouble, I think Boris would be of more use than Ken.”
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Who would you rather have with you as a back-up in that dark alley?”

Afghanistan - Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Campaign Finance - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Elections - Freedom - John Armor - Liberals - President - Society/Culture - Taxes

Wars and Dead Soldiers

November 5, 2009 by

-By John Armor

Late last week, in the dead of night. President Obama made an unannounced trip to Dover, Delaware, where he was photographed saluting some flag-covered coffins that were coming in from Afghanistan. There were about 18 coffins on this day. And afterwards, Obama said that this experience “would influence his decision” on troop levels and future policies in the war in that Afghanistan.

Well, first I fault the press. I’ve been saying for years that facts on war casualties, in Iraq, Afghanistan, or wherever, is defective. The national importance of casualties should be gauged by relative casualties in other, American wars. It’s called context. It is especially important in public issues involving deaths of Americans.

Is a disease or condition that kills ten children a year as worthy of public attention and millions of dollars of spending as a another disease that kills a thousand children a year? Put the question that way, and any sensible citizen or sensible politician will say, of course not. The focus and the spending should go where it will save the most lives, do the most good.

But that sort of question cannot be answered without the comparative statistics. Few things matter in the abstract. It is only when put in context that the importance of most fact can be weighed. By and large, the American press does not put death stories – civilian or military – in comparative context.

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Wars and Dead Soldiers”

Afghanistan - Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Europe - Iran - Islam - Islamofascism - Israel - Liberals - President - Society/Culture - Terrorism - Thomas Brewton - Western Civilization

Iran: Can Obama play hardball?

November 4, 2009 by

-By Thomas E. Brewton

Robert Kagan’s Washington Post column gives us a look at the way the president appears to be playing his hand in the diplomatic game.

President Obama notoriously promised to bring change to our foreign policy relations. His presumption, shared by most liberal-progressives, was that every nation in the world truly desires to eschew war as a policy instrument.

Liberal-progressives take their cue from Auguste Comte’s writings in the 1820s. Comte was supremely confident that international socialism, under the rubric of his Religion of Humanity, would bring people from all over the world to learn from French intellectuals the means for restructuring political society. Restructured societies, with socialistic redistribution of wealth, would no longer experience crime, aggression, or war. Acting as moral judges, intellectuals would dictate appropriate rules for personal and international relations.

The way to realize those presumed universal peace desires, in the liberal-progressive scenario, is to be sensitive, even obsequious, and never to take military or diplomatic action unilaterally. To show its faith in the promise of world peace and benevolence under international socialism, the United States is to set an example for the world by disarming itself and reducing its economic and military power to rough equality with such powers in the rest of the world.

This diplomatic paradigm, faithfully followed by President Obama in his dealings with our self-declared enemies, has so far produced nothing more than promises.
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Iran: Can Obama play hardball?”

Barack Obama - Christianity - Democrats/Leftists - Frank Salvato - Free Speech - Iran - Islam - Islamofascism - Israel - Liberals - Security/Safety - Society/Culture - Terrorism - Western Civilization

Pretending to Speak for an Entire Culture

November 4, 2009 by

-By Frank Salvato

One of the things that brings me to the boiling point is when I hear elected officials tell me what “Americans want” or what “Americans think.” To believe that today’s federally elected politicians understand – or care – what their constituents want, never mind Americans on the whole, after they belittled town hall attendees and ignored the citizenry’s opposition to government-run healthcare is to exist in fantasyland. No, federally elected politicians (and in many cases local politicians, as well) only invoke the wants and thoughts of “Americans” when they want to bolster their political positions and those have more to do with special interest groups and ideology than what Americans really think and want.

How many times have you heard Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, President Obama or any number of their surrogates – and to be fair and honest, it does happen on both sides of the aisle – begin a sentence with, “What Americans really want…” or “The Average American thinks that…” It is an insult to the intelligence of the citizenry, no matter how dumbed-down the American populace has become.

Another facet to this intellectual arrogance is when an elected official or public figure uses a “broad brush” to address an entire group or demographic, regardless of whether it is favorably or unfavorably.

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Pretending to Speak for an Entire Culture”

Anti-Americanism - Britain - Business - Capitalism - Congress - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Europe - Health - House of Representatives - Liberals - President - Senate - Society/Culture - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

Don’t Copy Europe’s Mistakes: Less Government Is the Right Way to Fix Healthcare

November 3, 2009 by

In this Center for Freedom and Prosperity Foundation video, Eline van den Broek explains that government interference is driving up healthcare costs in America and warns that European style health “reform” will make the situation even worse. Based on what has happened in Europe, she explains that universal health coverage is not the same as universal healthcare, that insurance mandates mean more government control, and that price controls simply do not work. More Information: www.freedomandprosperity.org

Barack Obama - Democrats/Leftists - Dr. Don Boys - Europe - Liberals - Media Bias - President - Society/Culture

Nobel Prize Committee, a Bunch of Hypocrites!

October 26, 2009 by 1 Comment

-By Don Boys, Ph.D.

The Nobel Prize has become a joke to informed people since, in recent years, it has become a farce, fraud, fake, and fatuity (a self-satisfied unintelligence)! However, the problem is that most people don’t know much about the Nobel Prize other than it is supposed to be the highest honor a person can receive. This year the prize for peace goes to Barack Obama, a man who has made no lasting positive contribution to the world.

Alfred Nobel died in 1872 leaving most of his fortune to establish prizes as determined by various committees in Sweden and Norway. The Peace Prize is determined by members of the Norway Parliament. The professions to be honored for outstanding achievements were physics, chemistry, medicine, literature, for work in peace, and now economics. So far, so good.

Al made his fortune by inventing dynamite, an invention that changed the face of the world for good and evil. It is interesting that he almost called his invention, “Nobels Safety Powder”! What a misnomer! He also developed “Gelignite,” a blasting gelatin that made drilling much more efficient and less expensive. Money started piling up in his bank account.
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Nobel Prize Committee, a Bunch of Hypocrites!”

Afghanistan - Barack Obama - Democrats/Leftists - Free Speech - Freedom - Islam - Islamofascism - Marriage - President - Security/Safety - Society/Culture - Taxes - Terrorism - Warner Todd Huston

Obama Abandons Abused Women in Afghanistan

October 19, 2009 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

President Barack Obama is putting the finishing touches on making a mockery out of the unsupportable claim that Democrats care about women’s rights by his signal to the Afghan Taliban, warlords, strongmen, militias, and tribal leaders that he’s ready to negotiate with anyone there in order to smooth his efforts in that troubled region.

President Obama is letting it be known that he’s prepared to cut deals with the Taliban in order for Afghan warlords to cut ties with al Qaeda. Obama thinks he can work with the supposedly “moderate” Taliban groups in Afghanistan in a bid to oust al Qaeda. A Taliban moderate. What sort of mythical creature is this?

One thing is sure, however, if Obama turns Afghanistan back over to the Taliban and other Islamic warlords in an effort to make it appear as if he’s had success there, women will be the hardest hit. The possibility that Obama will abandon Afghanistan’s women frightens Wazhma Frogh, an Afghan women’s advocate who received the U.S. State Department’s 2009 International Woman of Courage Award.
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Obama Abandons Abused Women in Afghanistan”

Afghanistan - Anti-Americanism - Chicago - Congress - Cook County - Democrats/Leftists - Elections - GOP - Illinois - Islam - Islamofascism - Journalism - Liberals - Media Bias - Military - Republicans - Security/Safety - Society/Culture - State Government - Terrorism - Warner Todd Huston

Where I Come to Mark Kirk’s Aid

October 18, 2009 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

I am not a Mark Kirk fan. For me he is and always has been far too “moderate” on social issues and his now (maybe) retracted Cap and Tax vote sticks in my craw pretty badly. But Steve Benen of the Washington Monthly blog Political Animal unfairly and illicitly slammed Kirk on something he said in an interview with The News Gazette of Danville, Illinois.

Benen was ticked at Kirk’s answer about the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy of the U.S. Military. In an effort to show all his LGBT, or BLGT, or BLT fans… whatever they call themselves this week… Benen jumped on Kirk’s claim that DADT works well and that “keeping that all out of the workplace makes common sense.”

But, Benen’s pandering to the fringe, militant gay lobby isn’t my concern here. Benen’s other jab at Kirk was as follows:
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Where I Come to Mark Kirk’s Aid”

Afghanistan - Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Budget - Business - Capitalism - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Freedom - President - Society/Culture - Taxes - Vince Johnson

Important Stories in the News

October 18, 2009 by

-By Vince Johnson

October 14, 2009 – Aumsville, Oregon – Vince Johnson has temporarily vacated retirement to bring you up to date on what will be happening in the next couple years:

1). Congress will pass a Health Insurance Reform Act and within three years after its passage, all existing health insurance providers will be replaced by a government controlled health insurance program. The elite media will applaud this reality and explain that this outcome was inevitable because the majority of Americans lack sufficient education and initiative to resolve this issue on their own. The people will therefore gratefully accept the supreme wisdom of Congress with feeble complaint and the politicians will find it convenient to ignore any questions requiring an intelligent response.

2). The war in Afghanistan will continue without the addition of an adequate number of U.S. troops because the inner conscience of one who won the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize for indecisively allowing the war to continue indefinitely, is honor bound to remain indecisive as long as it takes.
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Important Stories in the News”

Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Britain - Capitalism - Congress - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Europe - GOP - Health - House of Representatives - Liberals - President - Republicans - Society/Culture - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

Obamacare: Punishing 85% to Help 15%

October 17, 2009 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Representative Mike Rogers (R, Mich.) made some great points in his opening statements against Obamacare as the debate heats up in D.C. He began by asking why we are punishing 85% of America because of the problems of 15%? He also told us of how bad the survival rate for cancer in the U.K. is compared to the U.S. but that Obamacare will make our survival rate as bad as England’s.

Great stuff, Mr. Rogers, great stuff.
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Obamacare: Punishing 85% to Help 15%”

Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Budget - Business - Capitalism - Congress - Democrats/Leftists - Europe - Journalism - Liberals - Media Bias - President - Society/Culture - Taxes - Thomas Brewton

Bitten By Profligacy

October 17, 2009 by

-By Thomas E. Brewton

The dollar edges closer to becoming a third-world currency.

Foreign central banks, suffering from the Treasury and Fed-engineered decline in the dollar’s value, are moving new currency reserve investments from the dollar into Euros and Yen.

Long-range effects on the United States will be bad.

If foreign central banks continue to shift their currency reserves from the dollar to other currencies, the dollar will lose its international reserve currency status, damaging our nation’s future. Interest costs on the national debt will rise, reflecting a higher level of economic risk for foreign dollar holders. To pay higher interest on the national debt, taxes will have to rise, crimping business and depressing employment. Costs of our imports, upon which we came to depend for inexpensive consumer and industrial goods, will rise, because the dollar is worth less on international markets. Those higher import costs will reduce business profits, further constraining creation of new jobs.
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Bitten By Profligacy”

Afghanistan - Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Democrats/Leftists - Environment - Journalism - Liberals - Media Bias - Science - Security/Safety - Society/Culture - Terrorism - Warner Todd Huston

ABC News: Global Warming ‘Helps Taliban, al Qaeda’

October 13, 2009 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

Increasingly, the Old Media appears to be engaged in satire and here is another story that could serve as an example of it. ABC News has published a purportedly serious story claiming that global warming “helps” the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan and terrorists all over the world.

For ABC, writer Bill Blakemore makes the leap of logic that droughts and other climate situations in countries in which the U.S. Military is engaged is “man made.” Speaking about military studies that have been conducted into how climate is affecting the military situation, Blakemore writes, “a number of U.S. intelligence and military studies recently made public describe how man-made climate change plays into the hands of terrorist groups in many countries.”

The reports Blakemore is talking about do speak to the droughts around the world that are causing headaches for the U.S. Military, but Blakemore does not deliver any actual quotes that members of our Military are saying that it is because of “man-made global warming.”
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ABC News: Global Warming ‘Helps Taliban, al Qaeda’”

Barack Obama - Budget - Canada - Capitalism - Communism - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Free Trade - Freedom - Health - Liberals - President - Socialism - Society/Culture - Taxes - Warner Todd Huston

Canadians Talk About Their Nationalized Healthcare

October 13, 2009 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

The Mackinac Center has produced a video filled with Canadians warning us that their vaunted nationalized healthcare system, the one Barack Obama keeps pointing to as a model for us, is not all it’s claimed to be.

The MC took its cameras throughout Canada and asked Canadians what they thought of their nationalized, socialistic healthcare system and what they thought of the push in the United States to create its own copy of their system. Almost to a person they warned us against it and each worried that they themselves would lose one of their own healthcare benefits: American medicine used when their system fails them.

The Mackinac Center for Public Policy is a free market think tank in Michigan.

Visit the website of the Mackinac Center for the full video series of Canadian citizens speaking out on healthcare.
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Canadians Talk About Their Nationalized Healthcare”

Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Communism - Democrats/Leftists - Europe - Journalism - Liberals - Media Bias - Military - Palestinians - President - Religion - Security/Safety - Socialism - Society/Culture - Terrorism - Thomas Brewton - Western Civilization

Oslo Edition of Saturday Night Live

October 11, 2009 by

-By Thomas E. Brewton

Wolf Blitzer needs to continue his fact checking.

CNN’s Wolf Blitzer recently devoted time to fact-checking a Saturday Night Live skit that cast a less than favorable light upon failure of The One to deliver on his campaign promises.

Surely Mr. Blitzer will follow up with an analysis of the lack of basis for the Nobel committee’s awarding its Peace Prize to President Obama.

He will find his rebuttal work easy.

The President has done exactly nothing in the way of concrete action to stabilize volatile foreign conditions or to restrain rogue states (Iran, Russia, North Korea) that continually work to destabilize world political and economic conditions. No effective action, just talk, talk, talk. All of that talk has been ignored by rogue states, which have contemptuously dismissed Obama’s empty words and continued unrestrained in their campaigns to dominate Asia and the Middle East.
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Oslo Edition of Saturday Night Live”

Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Christianity - Democrats/Leftists - Islam - Islamofascism - Liberals - Military - Palestinians - President - Religion - Society/Culture - Terrorism - Warner Todd Huston - Western Civilization

Obama’s Muslim Advisor Says Sharia Law ‘Misunderstood’

October 9, 2009 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

It has been used to excuse the chopping off of hands and feet, it has been used as an excuse to stone women that have been victims of rape, and it has been used as an excuse to jail women merely for wearing a pair of pants, driving a car, or smoking a cigarette, but Barack Obama’s Muslim advisor told a British TV audience that Shariah Law has just been “misunderstood.”

Obama Muslim affairs advisor Dalia Mogahed (pictured) was a guest on a London-based TV show hosted by a member of the extremist Hizb ut Tahir al-Islami party (Islamic Party of Liberation), Ibtihal Bsis.

Hizb ut Tahir al-Islami seeks to eliminate western democracy and replace it with an extremist view of Islam which includes the creation of a world Islamic caliphate.

On the TV broadcast, Obama advisor Mogahed sat quiet while other guests and the host said that women should not be allowed to hold positions in government and that western democratic tradition was a “lethal cocktail of liberty and capitalism.”

But worse than not speaking up to these anti-woman and anti-western sentiments was what she herself added to the conversation. Speaking on the barbaric practice of Sharia law, Mogahed said:
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Obama’s Muslim Advisor Says Sharia Law ‘Misunderstood’”

Afghanistan - Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Democrats/Leftists - Islam - Islamofascism - Journalism - Liberals - Media Bias - Military - President - Security/Safety - Terrorism - Warner Todd Huston

Associated Press and Misleading Rhetoric on Afghanistan

October 8, 2009 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

The Associated Press employed some interesting rhetoric in its recent wire story on Obama’s coming decisions on the war in Afghanistan. It is rhetoric that might mislead a casual reader as to how many casualties the U.S. has incurred in Afghanistan and just when they’ve occurred as well as both Obama’s and the Bush administration’s stance on the war.

Perhaps it is just clumsy writing, but it is hard not to wonder if the AP meant to give Obama a bit of cover on the worsening situation there. And what is that cover? It’s another attempt at the “it’s Bush’s fault” media group think.

Obama, who inherited the war when he took office last January, is examining how to proceed with a worsening combat situation that has claimed nearly 800 U.S. lives and sapped American patience. Launched after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to defeat the Taliban and rid al-Qaida of a home base, the war has lasted longer than ever envisioned.

There are three problems with this AP paragraph. First it ignores that Obama campaigned on the concept that Afghanistan was “the good war,” second it misleads the reader into imagining that all these 800 casualties were lost in this current phase of a “worsening combat situation,” and third no one in the Bush administration ever said that the effort in Afghanistan would be short lived.
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Associated Press and Misleading Rhetoric on Afghanistan”

Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Communism - Congress - Democrats/Leftists - Frank Salvato - Freedom - Iran - Islam - Islamofascism - Liberals - Military - President - Security/Safety - Society/Culture - Terrorism

The Only Real Strategy for Afghanistan

October 6, 2009 by

-By Frank Salvato

There has been quite a bit of criticism directed at President Obama for his handling – or mishandling – of the Afghan theater in the global conflict with radical Islamists. To be certain, it should be the number one or, at the very least, number two item on his list of priorities. That it is not is deserving of criticism. But the catalyst for this dysfunctional thinking emanates from the reality that we, as a nation, don’t have a proper understanding of the conflict at hand and, therefore, have very different opinions – some based in fact but most influenced by ideology – as to the consequences of implementing the wrong strategy.

During the 2008 presidential campaign, then candidate Barack Obama identified the Afghan theater as the only “legitimate” military theater in which the US military was engaged. He did so in a politicized attempt to paint the Iraqi theater as illegitimate; an optional battle theater championed by his opponent. Whether or not you agree with that belief is irrelevant to the fact that Mr. Obama identified the Afghan theater as being “the good war.” This declaration, along with his promise to support the generals on the ground, intimated that he was going to respect the judgments and opinions of the field commanders with regard to strategy and assessment. That understood, it really shouldn’t be too much for the American people to expect their president to follow through on his campaign promises.

The Enemy

Ongoing military campaign aside, we have never really accurately profiled the enemy and therefore have never really been about to honestly contemplate a successful strategy for achieving victory in not only the Afghan theater but in the overall global conflict with radical Islamists.
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The Only Real Strategy for Afghanistan”

Europe - John Armor

Dubrovnik, Pearl of the Adriatic

October 5, 2009 by

-By John Armor

Dubrovnik, Croatia, in the former Yugoslavia, is a relatively new city by European standards. It began in the 7th century AD, when sailors and traders in its area built the first fortifications to protect themselves from raids by various interests, all classified as “barbarians.”

We would not have gone to this town except that it was one of the ports of call of the Costa Fortuna, an Italian ship with fine crew and service, on a eastern Mediteranian tour. We are very glad that by accident, we got to Dubrovnik.

It is one of the most successful of the city-states of Europe in maintaining its independence from various invaders and attackers. Venice held sway over the Republic of Dubrovnik for about a century. Napoleon conquered it in 1806 and on his fall, the European powers gave it to Austria. The Ottoman Empire conquered it during WW II. The remnants of the Yugoslavian Army laid siege to it for a year, shelled the town and killed thousands of people, but could not take the town.
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Dubrovnik, Pearl of the Adriatic”

Anti-Americanism - Barack Obama - Britain - Budget - Capitalism - Communism - Cook County - Democrats/Leftists - Economy/Finances - Europe - Health - Liberals - Socialism - Society/Culture - Warner Todd Huston

IMF Warns Britain to Dump ‘Free’ Healthcare to Avoid Financial Crisis

October 2, 2009 by 1 Comment

-By Warner Todd Huston

Britain’s vaunted nationalized healthcare system is bankrupting the nation and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is warning that if the UK doesn’t start charging for healthcare and raise the retirement age above 65 the country will not be able to get out from under the widening fiscal disaster.

The IMF is telling the British government that she must instigate a wholesale revamping of its pensioner and healthcare system to “help keep a lid on the debt.”

Treasury officials admitted recently that the deficit is expected to rise “£200billion this year – £25billion more than the Chancellor predicted in the Budget.”

That is the equivalent of £3,257 of debt for every man, woman and child, or £9,457 for the average family.

It should be pointed out that Britain’s deficit is no where near the Obama deficit in the U.S. and his $1 debt doesn’t even count any nationalized healthcare plan like the one Congress is desperately trying to pass.
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IMF Warns Britain to Dump ‘Free’ Healthcare to Avoid Financial Crisis”

Barack Obama - Chicago - Cook County - Democrats/Leftists - Europe - Warner Todd Huston

CHICAGO OUT in First Round of Olympics Voting!!

October 2, 2009 by

-By Warner Todd Huston

THE BBC HAS THE REPORT THAT CHICAGO DIDN’T EVEN GET PAST THE FIRST ROUND OF IOC VOTING FOR THE 2016 OLYMPICS.

All I have to say is “There IS a God.” Thanks be to him that we did NOT get this debacle forced upon the poor taxpayers of the state of Illinois.

This mess would take decades of tax burdens to pay off and would yield wasted space, useless construction, and absolutely no benefit to the city… unless you happen to be a broken nosed pal of the Daley machine. The crooks in City Hall’s pocket are the only people that would have benefitted from what would quickly have turned into a criminal enterprise.

BBC News’ Adam Brookes in Chicago: “The shock of Chicago’s elimination was greater for the fact that it came in the first round. And greater for the fact that President Obama had taken valuable hours from his packed and tense political schedule to travel to Copenhagen. His legendary powers of persuasion will be said to have failed him, though in reality it will be Chicago’s bid that failed him. Nonetheless, this is a moment which allows the president’s detractors to allege waning prestige on the part of his presidency. And it will raise questions about the political advice that he is receiving.”

And what a kick to Obama’s face, eh?
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CHICAGO OUT in First Round of Olympics Voting!!”

Ann "Babe" Huggett - Barack Obama - Britain - Crime - Democrats/Leftists - Humor - Journalism - Liberals - Media Bias - Socialism - Society/Culture

Drugged Out Of One’s Gourd

October 1, 2009 by

-By Ann “Babe” Huggett

Poor Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown of the UK has been the subject of some scurrilous web rumors lately that he is “self-medicating” by popping pills in order to “get himself through” his high pressure/low respect days. Who could blame Brown, if he took to at least the bottle after not only being snubbed five times in a row to get a bilateral conference with US President Barack Obama but ended up disgracing himself and his country over the Lockerbie bomber release-for-oil fiasco earlier on? Brown strikes me as a scotch and soda sort of fellow, who drinks in private but that old adage about never drinking alone because, if discovered, it will only arouse pity comes to mind here.

Normally, web rumors are just that and usually go no further especially in a country where the media works hand-in-hand with the government. The pro-Labour BBC is solidly leftist these days so Brown was not expecting the sucker punch live interview question on BBC TV by UK political presenter, Andrew Marr, when Andrew asked point blank, “…something everybody has been talking about in the Westminster village… A lot of people in this country use prescription painkillers and pills to help them get through. Are you one of them?”

Brown, of course, reacted in outrage because the insinuation carries behind it the acknowledgment that Labour has lost the approval of the media. Earlier in the week the UK’s political Rasputin of the Left, Business Secretary, Lord Mandelson, commented that he could easily work with the Tories should have let everyone know that Labour’s days in power are numbered.

Andrew Marr’s question is also interesting on a different level because, quite frankly, it needs to be asked of all the world’s current leaders. Drugs, booze, decadent excess, jet lag and plain old mental instability would go a long way in explaining why we’re all in this hand basket and where we are all going.
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Drugged Out Of One’s Gourd”