Great piece by Walter Russell Mead.  You know it’s true.

This is all bad news and very disturbing, but there is a crumb of comfort to be had.  Because these failures happened on President Obama’s watch, the mainstream press isn’t particularly interested in relentless, non-stop scrutiny of the unpleasant news.  If George W. Bush were president now, and had ordered the surge and was responsible for the strategic decisions taken and not taken in Afghanistan over the last four years, the mainstream press would be rubbing our noses in his miserable failures and inexcusable blunders 24/7.  The New York Times and the Washington Post would be treating us to pictures of every fallen soldier.  The PBS Newshour would feature nightly post-mortems on “America’s failed strategies in the Afghan War” and every arm-chair strategist in America would be filling the op-ed pages with the brilliant 20/20 hindsight ideas that our pathetic, clueless, failed president was too dumb and too cocky to have had.

There would be no end to the woes and the recriminations.  There would be the most moving and eloquent examples of hand wringing in the New York Review of Books, elegantly demonstrating that the cretinous assumptions and moral failings that led Bush into his failed Afghan policy weren’t his alone, but reflected broader, deeper failings in America itself.  One is almost sorry for the sake of the authors of these diatribes that Bush is gone; the failure of our Afghan strategy is so sweeping, so unavoidable, that it would be the best possible backdrop against which to paint a stirring portrait of a failed president misleading a flawed people.  What works of polemical literature have been lost, what inspired jeremiads will never be penned, what scalding portraits of America’s inherent flaws will never see the light of day because W left the White House too soon.

Entire piece here.

On this, one of the bleakest days in recent history, I thought it good to share a few quotations from a better, more coherent era.  All of these are attributed to President Ronald Reagan.

Socialism only works in two places, heaven where they don’t need it and hell where they already have it.

Here’s my strategy on the Cold War:  we win, they lose.

The most terrifying words in the English language are, “I’m from the government and I’m here to help you.”

The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they’re ignorant; it’s just that they know so much that isn’t so.

Of the four wars in my lifetime, none came about because the U.S.  was too strong.

The taxpayer: that’s someone who works for the federal government but doesn’t have to take the civil service examination.

Government is like a baby:  an alimentary canal with a big appetite at one end and no sense of responsibility at the other.

The nearest thing to eternal life we will ever see on this earth is a government program.

It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession.  I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first.

Government’s view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases:  If it moves, tax it.  If it keeps moving, regulate it.  And if it stops moving, subsidize it.

Politics is not a bad profession.  If you succeed, there are many rewards; if you disgrace yourself, you can always write a book.

No arsenal, or no weapon in the arsenals of the world, is as formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women.

The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money.  (Originally come from Margaret Thatcher, but we’re betting Ronald Reagan quoted her on it at least once!)

If we ever forget that we’re one nation under GOD, then we will be a nation gone under.

According to crime statistics reported by The London Telegraph (UK is violent crime capital of Europe, 02 July 2009), the “gun-free” United Kingdom (UK) is 4 times more violent than the USA.  According to the Telegraph:

… there are over 2,000 crimes recorded per 100,000 population in the UK, making it the most violent place in Europe.

Austria is second, with a rate of 1,677 per 100,000 people, followed by Sweden, Belgium, Finland and Holland.

By comparison, America has an estimated rate of 466 violent crimes per 100,000 population.

France recorded 324,765 violent crimes in 2007 – a 67 per cent increase in the past decade – at a rate of 504 per 100,000 population.

Note that France didn’t even make the top 6 in Europe, yet their violent crime rate is still greater than ours.  Entire article here.

I just remembered that it was the UK’s program to confiscate guns from law-abiding citizens that caused me to become a lifetime member of the NRA, some 15 years ago.

Will gun control reduce violence against school-children?  We were all horrified by shootings in Connecticut that left 26 dead.  We were indignant when the President of the United States used this tragedy to promote his own leftist political agenda.  And we are fearful of the violence that will descend upon all of us if Pres. Obama and his friends overturn the 2nd Amendment.

Of course, the people who work hardest to take away our right of self-protection (Hollywood leftists, politicians, etc.) are the people who live in gated communities and surround themselves with armed guards.  They don’t have to worry about home invasions.  What do they care about common folk like us?

A few facts to consider:

1. Chicago criminals, protected by some of the most restrictive gun laws in the country, shot 458 school-age children in 2012, killing 62 of them (source).  Another report says that 250 school-children have been killed in Chicago in 3 years (source).
2. Anders Behring Breivik killed 69 people in a single 2011 incident in Norway, which has very restrictive gun laws.  Nobody present was able to shoot back.
3. When selecting the target for his shooting rampage in Aurora, Colorado, gunman James Holmes selected the Cinemark theatre complex because it was the only one that banned guns.  Nobody present was able to shoot back (source).  One nearby theatre boasted “Colorado’s largest auditorium,” certainly a draw for a crazy man trying to kill as many people as he could, but they allowed permitted concealed handguns.
4. People in Russia can tell you what gun control has done to them.  They say “Never give up your guns.“

Never give up your guns.

Interesting item from Byron York at the Washington Examiner.  It seems that even left-wing kooks like Al Franken, Richard Durbin and Charles Schumer understand that the 2.3% tax on medical devices, scheduled to take effect on January 1, is a “job-killing” tax.

If that’s true, then aren’t all the other tax increases being enacted by the Dems also “job-killing” taxes?

We’ve always known that ObamaCare is a fiscal scam that will cost much, much more than they admit.  We know it will cost jobs.  Furthermore, it’s part of a burgeoning debt problem that will possibly devastate our children’s financial futures (if not worse).

I’m not sure which is worse, stealing from poor people by destroying their jobs, or stealing from our children by loading them up with ruinous debt.

By the way, the level of detail presented above is really inside baseball.  We understand it, but it is completely lost on the low-information voter.  When we talk to the low-information voter, we need to keep it simple.  Like this:

One political party is trying to get and keep political power by convincing us that there is this large group of people who are entitled — entitled, mind you — to a long list of free stuff.  Every election cycle, that group has to get larger and the list of free stuff has to get longer.  It’s all going to be paid for by this ever-smaller, ever more despised — despised, mind you —  group of producers.  How long do you think that will work?

Repeat that explanation every chance you get.

This is a critical point, because the Dems appeal to our natural compassion by pointing out needs … and our neighbors have many, many heart-breaking needs that cry out for intervention.  Some of their problems are self-inflicted; some are beyond their control.  But bloated Government is not about meeting needs; it’s about getting and keeping political power.  The more of your money they get, the more powerful they are.  They get your money by growing the dependency class.  In the long run, it simply won’t work.

Gregg Cunningham

A message from Gregg Cunningham, Executive Director of the Center for Bio-Ethical Reform (CBR):

CBR is an educational organization whose principal purpose is to discourage and ultimately ban elective abortion.  We pursue that goal by exposing the horror abortion represents.  Our duty is prophetic, so the public’s acceptance or rejection of our message neither heightens nor diminishes our duty to discharge that responsibility.

Speaking as an individual, by the narrowest of margins, roughly half the 2012 electorate has chosen evil over good and America’s planned decline will now accelerate.  If the leadership in the current House of Representatives caves on the “fiscal cliff” confrontation, our economy will be further weakened by extreme tax-and-spend socialism — see California and Europe to understand just how weakened.  Still more Americans will be disabled by reliance on unsustainable social welfare programs — see California and Europe to understand how just unsustainable.

Because of this defeat, our military will be dangerously compromised by the funding cuts necessitated by exploding national debt.  America’s influence in the world will continue to be dismantled as the intended purpose of Barack Obama’s foreign policy.  ObamaCare’s abortion mandates are now a central feature of American socialized medicine.  Supposedly “pro-life Democrat” Rep. Bart Stupak betrayed us to pass Obamacare.  Supposedly “constitutional conservative” Chief Justice John Roberts betrayed us to declare ObamaCare constitutional.  Supposedly “pro-life” New Jersey Governor Chris Christie betrayed us to essentially endorse Barack Obama and contribute to his reelection.  He reportedly turned on Mitt Romney because Romney dumped him as his vice presidential pick.  ObamaCare will now be impossible to repeal.

Unless our majority remains resolute in the U.S. House of Representatives, open borders and amnesty for illegal aliens will turn swing states so blue that pro-life candidates will become as unelectable there as they now are in California.  But doomed prolife candidates may not matter much because our federal courts will become so heavily packed with Barack Obama’s pro-abortion judges (confirmed by his Democrat Senate) that any significant attempt to restrict abortion will be struck down, and the reversal of Roe v. Wade is unlikely to occur during the lifetimes of even our movement’s youngest activists.

Despite the disaster which now awaits our country, CBR’s responsibility to expose the horror of abortion remains unchanged.  We have great people and great projects and our Key States Initiative (KSI) left America a far more pro-life nation today than it was six months ago.  Literally as I write this note, a CBR web survey arrived from a sixteen-year-old Pennsylvania girl who wrote to explain how our work has changed her life:  “I did support legal abortion but after seeing that video of the baby getting taken out I am against it. It is terrible!  How could someone kill something so small and helpless?”  She speaks for the many Americans who saw our imagery in battleground states this year and also changed their minds about abortion.  Our strategy and tactics are demonstrably effective.  Disturbing pictures are the history of social reform and the future of pro-life activism.

I intend no disrespect toward Governor Romney but I believe we could have won this narrowly decided election had we nominated a stronger candidate with a more effective campaign.  Governor Romney had liabilities which Barack Obama’s Chicago campaign skillfully exploited.  And Governor Romney’s campaign missed many opportunities to take the fight to the president.  Barack Obama emphasized abortion to single women (who now outnumber married women for the first time in American history) but their vote might have been overcome by a more convincing pitch to independents and greater appeal to our conservative base.  I remain confident that our strong field of reform-minded conservative governors and senators (as well as Rep. Paul Ryan) will produce a stronger ticket in 2016.  The tragic state of country after eight years of Barack Obama and Joe Biden should leave even this closely divided nation ready for a new course.

God is about to teach the Obama electorate a painful lesson in response to their intransigence, a lesson Greece is just beginning to learn.  We will all have to suffer this chastening but I thank God for all you did to educate voters over the last six months.  I assure you that your work was not in vain.  God will honor it in the fullness of time.  Remember that in the late eighteenth century, fully three-quarters of the world’s population was in bondage to some form of forced labor.  The abolition of slavery seemed unthinkable.  By God’s grace, a hand-full of reformers changed everything.  Now we must refresh ourselves and continue to follow their indomitable example.

A Psalm of David

1 Do not fret because of evil men
or be envious of those who do wrong;
2 for like the grass they will soon wither,
like green plants they will soon die away.

3 Trust in the Lord and do good;
dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture.
4 Delight yourself in the Lord
and he will give you the desires of your heart.

5 Commit your way to the Lord;
trust in him and he will do this:
6 He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn,
the justice of your cause like the noonday sun.

7 Be still before the Lord
and wait patiently for him;
do not fret when men succeed in their ways,
when they carry out their wicked schemes.

8 Refrain from anger and turn from wrath;
do not fret—it leads only to evil.
9 For evil men will be cut off,
but those who hope in the Lord will inherit the land.

10 A little while, and the wicked will be no more;
though you look for them, they will not be found.
11 But the meek will inherit the land
and enjoy great peace.

12 The wicked plot against the righteous
and gnash their teeth at them;
13 but the Lord laughs at the wicked,
for he knows their day is coming.

14 The wicked draw the sword
and bend the bow
to bring down the poor and needy,
to slay those whose ways are upright.
15 But their swords will pierce their own hearts,
and their bows will be broken.

16 Better the little that the righteous have
than the wealth of many wicked;
17 for the power of the wicked will be broken,
but the Lord upholds the righteous.

18 The days of the blameless are known to the Lord,
and their inheritance will endure forever.
19 In times of disaster they will not wither;
in days of famine they will enjoy plenty.

20 But the wicked will perish:
The Lord’s enemies will be like the beauty of the fields,
they will vanish—vanish like smoke.

21 The wicked borrow and do not repay,
but the righteous give generously;
22 those the Lord blesses will inherit the land,
but those he curses will be cut off.

23 If the Lord delights in a man’s way,
he makes his steps firm;
24 though he stumble, he will not fall,
for the Lord upholds him with his hand.

25 I was young and now I am old,
yet I have never seen the righteous forsaken
or their children begging bread.
26 They are always generous and lend freely;
their children will be blessed.

27 Turn from evil and do good;
then you will dwell in the land forever.
28 For the Lord loves the just
and will not forsake his faithful ones.

They will be protected forever,
but the offspring of the wicked will be cut off;
29 the righteous will inherit the land
and dwell in it forever.

30 The mouth of the righteous man utters wisdom,
and his tongue speaks what is just.
31 The law of his God is in his heart;
his feet do not slip.

32 The wicked lie in wait for the righteous,
seeking their very lives;
33 but the Lord will not leave them in their power
or let them be condemned when brought to trial.

34 Wait for the Lord
and keep his way.
He will exalt you to inherit the land;
when the wicked are cut off, you will see it.

35 I have seen a wicked and ruthless man
flourishing like a green tree in its native soil,
36 but he soon passed away and was no more;
though I looked for him, he could not be found.

37 Consider the blameless, observe the upright;
there is a future for the man of peace.
38 But all sinners will be destroyed;
the future of the wicked will be cut off.

39 The salvation of the righteous comes from the Lord;
he is their stronghold in time of trouble.
40 The Lord helps them and delivers them;
he delivers them from the wicked and saves them,
because they take refuge in him.

Great video.  Already seen by >0.6 million viewers.

Please share this video with your friends!

A Time for Choosing
by Ronald Wilson Reagan
October 27, 1964

As timely today as it was 48 years ago.

This is the issue of this election: Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capitol can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves.
***
But beyond that, “the full power of centralized government”—this was the very thing the Founding Fathers sought to minimize. They knew that governments don’t control things. A government can’t control the economy without controlling people. And they know when a government sets out to do that, it must use force and coercion to achieve its purpose. They also knew, those Founding Fathers, that outside of its legitimate functions, government does nothing as well or as economically as the private sector of the economy.
***
For three decades, we’ve sought to solve the problems of unemployment through government planning, and the more the plans fail, the more the planners plan.
***
Well, the trouble with our liberal friends is not that they’re ignorant; it’s just that they know so much that isn’t so.
***
No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. So governments’ programs, once launched, never disappear.  Actually, a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we’ll ever see on this earth.
***
Now it doesn’t require expropriation or confiscation of private property or business to impose socialism on a people. What does it mean whether you hold the deed to the—or the title to your business or property if the government holds the power of life and death over that business or property? And such machinery already exists. The government can find some charge to bring against any concern it chooses to prosecute. Every businessman has his own tale of harassment. Somewhere a perversion has taken place. Our natural, unalienable rights are now considered to be a dispensation of government, and freedom has never been so fragile, so close to slipping from our grasp as it is at this moment.
***
You and I have a rendezvous with destiny.  We’ll preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we’ll sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness.

Bill Whittle: Falling on Principle.

This video speaks to those considering a vote for a 3rd-party candidate or a vote for nobody at all.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPjBXufufUU

Julie Borowski parody of Lena Dunham ad for Barack Obama (Your First Time).  It would be more funny if the truth it exposes weren’t so creepy.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAkdHzpXXo0

Two creepy videos from the Democratic Party.  We wonder if they make the rank-and-file Democrats proud.

Warning: vile and suggestive language.  Viewer discretion advised.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nIecRcfQKI4

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOGh64dyGpc

Fascinating interview with Camille Paglia, Professor of Arts and Media Studies at the University of Arts in Philadelphia.  (Link also here; you may have to register and login, but it’s worth the trouble.)

A true maverick with something to offend everyone, Paglia has been described as “a writer in a category of her own … a feminist who hates affirmative action; an atheist who respects religion” and “a Democrat who thinks her party doesn’t get it.”

Camille Paglia on education (particularly art education):

[Because of sneering liberalism], students are emerging from our schools mal-educated.

On the loss of art education programs in schools:

American school children losing their art programs are paying the price for the art world’s delusional sense of entitlement.

Camille Paglia on ObamaCare:

Of course we need health care reform in this country.  What a mess!  Everyone agrees about that.  But ObamaCare is, to me, a Stalinist intrusion into American culture. …

I don’t understand how any veteran of the 1960s who’s a Democrat could not see the dangers here, that Obama is a statist.  It’s exactly what Bob Dylan was warning about in Subterranean Homesick Blues.

You don’t want government agencies being empowered to intrude into people’s lives like this.  The controlling force in ObamaCare is the IRS!  This flies in the face of what the Free Speech Movement was about at Berkeley or about any of the values of my generation.

On the Democratic Party:

I don’t see progressives.  All I see is white upper-middle-class liberals who speak in this unctuous way about the needs of the poor.  They have no connection whatever with the working class.  It’s the professional class gone amok.  And that’s why they don’t notice what a bureaucratic nightmare ObamaCare is.

Entire interview: http://www.pjtv.com/s/GEYDSNZS

The Jimmy Kimmel Live Show asked people on the street who won “last night’s First Lady” debate.  Of course, there has been no First Lady debate, and there never has been.  But that didn’t stop these clowns from having definite opinions!

The Jimmy Kimmel Live Show asked people on the street who won “last night’s” debate?  Unknown to those on camera is one inconvenient fact: the debate hadn’t happened yet!  They were asking the questions 4 hours before the debate!