Big Government

by

Does the GOP really need to say what it is for?

Okay, okay, okay …. I understand what you’re saying. The Republican Party needs to say what it’s for; what it would do to return the government to the people.

With all of the reading and research I do, a close friend of mine continues to advise me – ME – as to what the GOP needs to do.   His latest push was to bring to my attention Peggy Noonan’s column, Republicans Need a Direction.

In effect, Noonan seems to foresee another 2012 election, when few people thought President Obama, with his lousy record, had a chance of winning. Mitt Romney won the initial debate hands down, but he listened to establishment advisors, who told him not to  attack and present a “nice guy” image.  That bad advice, a poor turnout of Republican voters, and another masterful get-out-the-vote by “team Obama” sunk the GOP.

Noonan (lonelyconservative.com)

Columnist Peggy Noonan’s pieces appear in the Wall Street Journal. (lonelyconservative.com)

“In a year when Republicans are operating in such an enviable political environment, why aren’t their U. S. Senate candidates holding big and impressive leads? Why does it look close? Why are party professionals getting worried?

The Democrat president is unpopular (again). What progress can be claimed in the economy is tentative, uneven, feels temporary. True, unemployment is bad and people who have jobs feel stressed and hammered by costs. Americans are less optimistic than they’ve ever been in the modern era, with right-track/wrong-track numbers upside down.  Scandals, war, uncertain (no) leadership – all this has yielded a sense the whole enterprise of the past six years just did not work.” 

So wrote Noonan, adding, “If Republicans can’t make, catch and ride a wave in an environment like this, they’ve gone from being the stupid party to the stupid loser party.” Continue reading →

by

It can all be traced back to President Obama

You may be shocked by the current revelations of security screw ups by the Secret Service, but you shouldn’t be surprised, because it can easily be traced back to the culture in the White House.

Obama (abcnews.go.com)

Evidence of a culture of “whatever” in the Obama White House continues to mount. (abcnews.go.com)

We have a president who regularly flouts the rule-of-law. He has made changes and waivers to existing law; he was found guilty by the Supreme Court for making illegal recess appointments; he traded five Guantanamo prisoners for Sergeant Bergdahl without Congressional approval; and he’s set to implement a broad amnesty on his own following the mid-terms.

On the morally unethical side, President Obama flew to a fundraiser in Las Vegas after our ambassador and three other Americans were killed in the Benghazi attack and, he was on the golf course just minutes after “grieving” with the parents of James Foley, who was beheaded by ISIS.

What kind of respect can government employees in our various departments and agencies have for a president who laughs off inefficiencies and in some cases criminal activities, as “phony scandals.” Continue reading →

by

Finally, Holder to go!

Holder to go0011

On Jan. 2, 2012, my op-ed piece, It’s time for AG Holder to go, appeared on the editorial pages of the San Antonio Express-News.  And this week, we finally learned that Attorney General Eric Holder has decided to resign.

Holder goers (csmonitor.com)

Finally, Attorney General Eric Holder decided to resign. (csmonitor.com)

Clearly, it was good news, but oh my, the damage he has done to the rule of law in our country. Holder’s outrageous actions make the oft-criticized decisions of John Ashcroft,  Alberto Gonzales, and even Janet Reno, seem so insignificant.

While most Americans likely believe the disapproval of Holder is centered in the Republican Party, not so.  Just 15 percent of Americans have a positive or very positive view (6 percent) of Holder, according to a recent NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll.  Thirty-two percent have a negative view of Holder while four times as may have a very negative view (22 percent). Continue reading →

by

An unusual request for help at the UN

  “In a summer marked by instability in the Middle East and Eastern Europe, I know the world also took notice of the small American city of Ferguson, Missouri – where a young man was killed, and a community was divided.”

Unbelievably, those were the words of President Obama as he brought to a close his address to the United Nations General Assembly on Wednesday intended to seek support for the war against – my words – Islamic extremists.

“So yes, we have our own racial tensions,” he went on to say, “And like every country, we have our racial and ethnic tensions.”

Can you believe it? Comparing the Ferguson shooting to the beheading and mass killings by ISIL, al Qaeda and other Islamist extremist spin-offs?

Courtesy elektroka

(Poster courtesy elektroka)

Nine paragraphs into his speech, he finally gets to the point. “There is much to be done to meet the tests of this moment. But today I’d like to focus on two defining questions at the root of many our challenges – whether the nations here today will be able to renew the purpose of the UN’s founding (he’s dreaming); and whether we will come together to reject the cancer of extremism (not likely).”  He left them with this less than memorable quote, “For America, the choice is clear.  We choose hope over fear.”  “Hope,” where have we heard that before?

We are facing the most barbaric, evil terrorists we could have imagined, and our president is talking “hope?”

I was also taken aback by an earlier statement in his speech. “I have made it clear that America will not base our entire foreign policy on reacting to terrorism. Rather, we have waged a focused campaign against al Qaeda and its associated forces – taking out their leaders, and denying them the safe havens they rely upon.”  Then he said, “At the same time, we have reaffirmed that the United States is not and never will be at war with Islam.  Islam teaches peace.  Muslims the world over aspire to live with dignity and a sense of justice.  And when it comes to America and Islam, there is no us and them – there is only us, because millions of Muslim Americans are part of the fabric of our country.”  Really, Mr. President?  How do you think Americans would respond to a poll on that? Continue reading →

by

And she wants to be president, Part 6

Just four days ago I stated that the deaths of Ambassador Chris Stevens, Sean Smith, Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty can be attributed to Hillary Clinton’s decision to cut back security at the Benghazi mission compound. (See my post Lack of security in Benghazi points to Clinton, 9/13/14.) Two more events tend to support my contention that confidants aided in the cover-up.

An after-hours document scrubbing at State

attkisson (realclearpolitics)

Sharyl Attkisson interviewed former state department official Raymond Maxwell about an after-hours document scrubbing. (realclearpolitics.com)

maxwell (whatamimissinghere.com)

Former state department official Raymond Maxwell told Sharyl Attkisson about an after-hours document scrubbing. (whatamimissisnghere.com)

Two days after that post, Sharyl Attkisson broke a story of a Sunday after-hours document scrubbing in the basement operations center at the State Department. Her source was former Deputy Assistant Secretary Raymond Maxwell, who was a leader in the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, charged with collecting e-mails and documents relevant to the Benghazi probe. He was a 21-year Foreign Service veteran at State.

Hearing about the document scrubbing effort, he decided to look into it. Upon arrival he observed boxes and stacks of documents and the presence of one of Clinton’s top advisors. She told Maxwell, “We are to go through these stacks and pull out anything that might put anybody in the front office or the seventh floor in a bad light.”  The seventh floor was where Clinton and her principal advisors were located. Continue reading →

by

GOP addresses women’s concerns; Dems fear strong female Republican candidates in mid-terms

 It’s your body.  They want to take away your birth control.  They will repeal Roe v Wade.  They oppose equal pay for women.

They’re at it again.  Democrats, NOW, NARAL and other feminist groups. They’re following their belief that if you tell a lie enough times it eventually is believed to be the truth.  Their playbook, Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals, says, “If you push a negative hard enough, it will push through and become a positive.”

I’m not a woman, but if I was, this would be an outright insult to my intelligence.

A friend recently brought to my attention his concern that the GOP was ignoring the belief among women that Republicans were oblivious to issues of concern to women.  He cited an article about a study conducted by two Republican groups that painted a dismal picture of Republicans among women.

imagesT8YBR0JNThese groups, American Crossroads and the American Action Network,  well aware of how women voted in 2012, aanconducted the study not only to see if two more years under Obama changed their position, but to develop a strategy for addressing their concerns.  While married women clearly supported Mitt Romney, single women overwhelmingly supported the President in 2012.  The mere fact that Republicans undertook this study should tell skeptics that the party is aware of this shortcoming and should tell women, “yes we hear you.”

I’m confident that Republicans will be presenting ideas that could interest women to at least give the GOP a “fresh look.”  At the same time, however, it will be incumbent upon Republican candidates to neuter those claims quoted at the top of this post. Continue reading →

by

Surprise! Senate subcommittee whitewashes IRS scandal; claims “no political bias”

“The majority report (Democrat) asserts that there was no political bias in the way the IRS selected groups for additional scrutiny and that conservative groups and liberal (progressive) groups were treated equally,” was the finding of the Senate subcommittee led by Michigan’s outgoing Sen. Carl Levin.  As usual, the report was released late Friday to avoid major news coverage.… read more