I was asked the question in the title so I thought I would provide a short answer with some supporting evidence.
Socialists like Soros are not truly into socialism, they are into control. Envy is the tool and socialism is the vehicle that he and people like him use.
There are essentially three kinds of socialists:
The Control Freak: We are the ruling elite and are born to rule. Follow me and stay out of my way or else…
The Utopian: The Utopian wants to create a perfect society which is impossible. The more they tighten their grip the more slips through their fingers. When Utopians come into power they often lose that naivete and become control freaks.
The Sucker: Those who have swallowed the envy narrative. They see someone else get taxed or punished who has more and that makes them feel better in spite of the fact that they are not better off for it and are in fact, worse off. Why? Because envy corrupts the spirit and the thought process. There are 37% fewer millionaires in the country now than when Obama got elected. If this is all about redistribution of wealth let me ask you – how much of that money did you get?
Obama while giving a speech to Google blasted the Chamber of Commerce for opposing a raise in the top marginal tax rate to 39.9% because millionaires and billionaires weren’t paying their fair share.
Google paid 2.4% federal tax on 3.1 billion in income. Google doesn’t pay the top marginal rate – small to medium sized businesses called “S-Corps” do.
Google pays the corporate rate and has the influence to get favors in the 60,000 page tax code. Google also makes money overseas and chooses not to repatriate the profits.
Raising the top marginal tax rate doesn’t effect millionaires and billionaires because by and large they do not pay that tax, but small businesses would get soaked. Google and GE pay next to nothing and small to medium domestic business pays 39.9% (albeit with some deductions). This is how President Obama and the leadership of his party define fairness. Now you have just figured out why the largest Wall Street outfits and many other mega-corporations donate to Democrats in such numbers over Republicans.
Hence Norton’s First Law: Big Business loves big government because big government taxes and regulates the small and medium sized domestic competition out of the competition.
The taxes Democrats propose to “soak the rich” always seem to miss those who they demagogue for not paying their fair share. They have been “soaking the rich” for decades and keep missing the target. Why? – LINK
Related:
George Soros and Warren Buffet benefited from Obama Keystone Pipeline Veto – LINK.
In the process she tells whopping lies about RomneyCare in Massachusetts.
Pam Bondi says that RomneyCare cuts costs and expands choice, both claims are shown to be false with just minutes of research.
As far as cutting costs, RomneyCare was not designed to cut costs and they said so when creating it. Romney’s team made it clear that they aimed for “universal coverage” first, and decided to worry about controlling costs later – LINK.
Costs continue to rise faster in Massachusetts than in the rest of the country. So much so that when one examines the details of just how much RomneyCare costs not just the Massachusetts tax payer, but the American taxpayer you will not be pleased.
Be sure to read this entire post.
You paid the high cost of RomneyCare in Massachusetts… – LINK and here is an excerpt:
The High Price of Massachusetts Health Care Reform
I heard Trent Lott on the radio trashing conservatives to protect Mitt Romney. I can’t say that I am very surprised but I sure am disappointed.
Sometimes I really believe that the so called “inside Republican establishment” would rather have a Democrat elected than a Reagan conservative; just as Charlie Crist tried to do, much of whose senior staff works for Mitt Romney.
The same establishment that opposed Ronald Reagan now pretends that he doesn’t exist with narratives like “People like Newt can’t win” – meaning conservatives can’t win elections… only people like Dole, Ford, McCain and Romney can. Then they have the gall to claim that they are more like Reagan.
If the GOP does not perform and present serious change in a big way against institutionalized leftism people will conclude that there is not enough difference between Democrats and Republicans and it will be Ross Perot’s and such all over again.
The GOP “establishment STILL has not learned the lessons from 2006, 2008 and 2010.
We do not post about religion and God as much as we should, so to help remedy that we present to you Ann Barnhardt’s mailbag. No matter what you may think of her politics Ann gives a great testimony. You will love it 🙂
POSTED BY ANN BARNHARDT
1.
Dear Ann,
Could you please stop posting the Lord’s Prayer every day? It significantly reduces the number of visible posts.
Signed,
Reader
Dear Reader,
Congratulations! You win this month’s “Way to Completely Miss The Point” award! And given the nature of the award, here is the requisite excruciatingly direct answer to your question: Uh, no. I cannot stop posting the Lord’s Prayer every day. Mmm-kay? Yeah. Thanks.
Repetitively,
Ann
2.
Dear Ann,
I thought you hated all secular music. You’re always complaining about “rockband church”, and then you post Elvis and try to make some connection to God. You need to make up your mind.
Signed,
I Don’t Understand Context
——————————————–
Dear I Don’t Understand Context,
Let’s say your best friend has been arrested, tried in a kangaroo court and sentenced to execution for a crime that YOU committed. Before the actual execution, your best friend is tortured, whipped until skinned, and then led through the streets being mocked, pelted and spit upon by huge crowds. He finally gets to the place of execution and is stripped naked and then NAILED hand and foot to two beams to hang and slowly asphyxiate. Amazingly, your best friend does all of this willingly, and is even CONSOLED by the fact that you are present at his execution. What is the proper, moral and dignified way for you to behave while you hold vigil at the place of execution while your best friend dies in agony on your behalf?
A.) “Day-um. This is SO FLIPPING BOOOORING. This is SOOO STUPID. I can think about my friend at home just the same as here. AND I can do chores or watch the football game at the same time! I’m out. Peace, yo.”
B.) “I’ll hang around, but there better be a kick-ass rock band, a PowerPoint show and a stand-up comedy routine or else I AM OUT. If I’m not seriously entertained, then forget it. Oh, and if ANYONE brings up the fact that my friend is dying on my behalf for crimes that I COMMITTED and tries to lay some sort of guilt trip on me, I’m just going to leave. Screw that.”
C.) “I’ll go, but they had better let me talk and sing and be an on-site usher or else I AM OUT. I’m not going to go and just be anonymous and ignored, because if you think about it, this really is ALL ABOUT ME.”
D.) On knees, SILENT, head covered, SILENT, mortified, SILENT, begging in prayer for your Best Friend to forgive you, and telling Him how much you love Him and His Sacrifice of Himself for you. Oh, and SILENT.
The correct answer is . . . D.
When you are at the foot of the Cross at Mass (because that is what the Mass is – the bending of time in order to touch today to Calvary 1979 years ago), you SHUT YOUR MOUTH, GET ON YOUR KNEES and PRAY, just exactly as The Virgin Mary, St. Mary Magdalene and St. John did. They didn’t talk. They didn’t sing super-fun songs in order to entertain themselves or the others there present and show off their musical abilities. They didn’t laugh, or relax or have fun. They got on their knees, beheld the Crucified Christ, and wept and PRAYED. Christ Crucified is NOT ENTERTAINING. Christ Crucified is not “fun”. You don’t play secular music, or music that is trying to sound secular and thus be “entertaining”, AT CALVARY. To do so is, frankly, narcissistic to the point of being utterly deranged.
It is called CONTEXT. If you don’t have it, get it.
In keeping with the situation,
Ann
MAILBAG #3 – A SIMPLE QUESTION
3.
Dear Ann,
Could you please explain the Trinity?
Signed,
Unreasonably High Expectations
————————————
Dear Unreasonably High Expectations,
In a word, no. No one can. It is a mystery. And I find this consoling. Frankly, the fact that the Church says straight-out that there are certain things which are simply unable to be comprehended by human beings is a testament to the legitimacy of the Church as a teaching authority. Never trust any human being or group of human beings who claim to “know everything”. Anyone who claims to know everything is, by definition, a liar right out of the chute, because only God knows everything.
There are several huge mysteries of faith: the Trinity (one God in Three Divine Persons), the Incarnation (Jesus Christ being both fully God and fully human) and the Eucharist (bread and wine being transubstantiated into the physical Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ).
How can God be One in Being, but Father, Son and Holy Ghost? I dunno. It’s a mystery.
How can Jesus be both fully God and fully Man? I dunno. It’s a mystery.
How can something that was bread a few minutes ago, and still looks like bread, and still smells and tastes like bread actually be God? And how did that change occur? I dunno. It’s a mystery.
Regarding the Trinity, here is what we do know. The entire point and revelation of God in the Old Testament is the reality that there is not a “pantheon” of many gods, but that there is, in fact, only ONE God. If you had to pin down what the point of the Old Testament is – that’s it in a very, very simple nutshell. GOD IS ONE.
The Torah, or the first five books of the Old Testament, were written by Moses. The entire point of Moses’ life was to bear witness to the fact that there is only ONE GOD. There was absolutely no ambiguity about this. None. But, if we look at literally the FIRST CHAPTER of the book of Genesis, we see something amazing. Verse 26:
“And He said: Let Us make man to Our image and likeness: and let him have dominion over the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the air, and the beasts, and the whole earth, and every creeping creature that moveth upon the earth.”
Moses spent most of his adult life in interface with and witnessing for The ONE TRUE GOD. And yet he can’t get more than a couple hundred words into his written record and he is using PLURAL PRONOUNS – “Us” and “Our” – when quoting the ONE TRUE GOD.
SURELY Moses, of all people, wouldn’t make the sloppy mistake of using plural pronouns. SURELY someone around Moses, and for the centuries upon centuries afterward, would say, “Hey! You’ve got plural pronouns here! Shouldn’t we fix that? Afterall, it completely undercuts the whole “GOD IS ONE” thing we are trying to communicate here.”
Nope. Not only did Moses write it that way, but it STAYED that way for all of these centuries.
About the most that can be said about the Triune Godhead is this: God is RELATIONAL to Himself. God is Love – and what is love? Love is the complete giving of one’s self, and love is the act of fully RECEIVING and then returning love. Soooo . . . if God were NOT relational to Himself, how could He have existed as existential love before the creation of the universe? Who was He loving? Was He sitting around pondering Himself? How does inward-turned naval gazing constitute a GIFT of self? What love was He receiving? How could God receive love if He was the only thing that existed?
Because God is, in Himself, able to relate to Himself. Christ revealed to us that God is Three Divine Persons, all distinct but yet completely One in Being. Got your head around that? No, of course not. We can’t FULLY grasp that existential reality any more than we can grasp and explicitly describe what a fifth dimension would look like. But Christ did give us names for the Three Persons in Matthew 28:19 so that we could relate a little bit to the Trinity. Those names are: Father, Son and Holy Ghost. The words “Father and Son” are not a perfect analogue because the Father did not exist before the Son, as in the human case. The Three Divine Persons of the Trinity are co-eternal. No one can explain that. No one can explain eternity. All we can do is name it, and then get on with living. Also, there is the issue of gender, which is another post, but suffice it to say that God contains “femaleness” and women are not a foreign mystery to Him.
So, God the Father gives Himself fully to God the Son. God the Son then fully receives that love, and then returns it to God the Father fully. This infinite back-and-forth of love is so existentially perfect that it yields a Third, which Jesus taught us to call “The Holy Ghost”. The big human clue-in to all of this is human procreation. A man loves his wife and gives himself to her fully and completely. The wife loves her husband and thus receives his gift of himself in the form of his DNA and offers her own DNA in return. The two gifts of self are so perfect and complete that they actually become a third person.
Thus, the Triune Godhead is the foundational reality, and human procreation is the DERIVATIVE, which points back to the underlying reality of the Trinity. And yes, eventually every derivative expires, and upon expiry there is a delivery and the books get settled and squared. That would be “death” and “judgment”. As a (former) futures broker, I like that part. 🙂
Here is a classic song that touches on the crux of what real, Trinitarian love is: “Nature Boy”, best performed by Nat King Cole.
Well, some people have taken that video of mine and built an entire 52 minute piece around it, inserting citations, clips of Romney himself, news stories, and all kinds of HILARIOUS pop-culture references. There are movie clips, Randall the Honey Badger guy (a huge guilty pleasure of mine) makes several appearances, even Beavis and Butthead have cameos. The work that went into this was enormous, and the editing is superb. It is long, but it is very informative while being laugh-out-loud funny.
These companies get a big chunk of tax-dollars, the companies are ran by Obama fundraising bundlers and/or contributors; they write a big check to Obama for President, pay themselves fat and go out of business.
CBS News’ Sharyl Attkisson takes a look at 11 more Solyndras that were part of Obama’s Energy program. Attkisson was one of the original reporters that uncovered the Solyndra scandal.
CBS News counted 12 clean energy companies that are having trouble after collectively being approved for more than $6.5 billion in federal assistance. Five have filed for bankruptcy: The junk bond-rated Beacon, Evergreen Solar, SpectraWatt, AES’ subsidiary Eastern Energy and Solyndra.
According to CBS News, Beacon Power, a “green energy storage company,” received $43 million from the government. Standard and Poor’s had given the project a rating of “CCC-plus.”
Obama’s veto of the Keystone oil deal with Canada is beyond stupid. It is instant jobs, instant oil from a friendly country in a strategically sound place. There is no sane reason to oppose it.
This is a great call into Rush today from a self-identified black man named Dennis who has finally abandoned not only his support for Obama but says he is considering dropping his support for the Democrat party too. And his tipping point was Obama’s pandering to environmentalists in rejecting the Keystone Pipeline.
This is amazing. The lies are so huge that I am about to break my own rule against Nazi comparisons: it smacks of Goebbles saying that the bigger the lie, the more people are likely to believe it. The lies in this video are beyond whopping and are easily demonstrated with readily available facts.
A candidate for public office in any contemporary democracy may have to consider what, if anything, to do about “global warming.” Candidates should understand that the oft-repeated claim that nearly all scientists demand that something dramatic be done to stop global warming is not true. In fact, a large and growing number of distinguished scientists and engineers do not agree that drastic actions on global warming are needed.
In September, Nobel Prize-winning physicist Ivar Giaever, a supporter of President Obama in the last election, publicly resigned from the American Physical Society (APS) with a letter that begins: “I did not renew [my membership] because I cannot live with the [APS policy] statement: ‘The evidence is incontrovertible: Global warming is occurring. If no mitigating actions are taken, significant disruptions in the Earth’s physical and ecological systems, social systems, security and human health are likely to occur. We must reduce emissions of greenhouse gases beginning now.’ In the APS it is OK to discuss whether the mass of the proton changes over time and how a multi-universe behaves, but the evidence of global warming is incontrovertible?”
In spite of a multidecade international campaign to enforce the message that increasing amounts of the “pollutant” carbon dioxide will destroy civilization, large numbers of scientists, many very prominent, share the opinions of Dr. Giaever. And the number of scientific “heretics” is growing with each passing year. The reason is a collection of stubborn scientific facts.
Perhaps the most inconvenient fact is the lack of global warming for well over 10 years now. This is known to the warming establishment, as one can see from the 2009 “Climategate” email of climate scientist Kevin Trenberth: “The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can’t.” But the warming is only missing if one believes computer models where so-called feedbacks involving water vapor and clouds greatly amplify the small effect of CO2.The lack of warming for more than a decade—indeed, the smaller-than-predicted warming over the 22 years since the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) began issuing projections—suggests that computer models have greatly exaggerated how much warming additional CO2 can cause. Faced with this embarrassment, those promoting alarm have shifted their drumbeat from warming to weather extremes, to enable anything unusual that happens in our chaotic climate to be ascribed to CO2.
The fact is that CO2 is not a pollutant. CO2 is a colorless and odorless gas, exhaled at high concentrations by each of us, and a key component of the biosphere’s life cycle. Plants do so much better with more CO2 that greenhouse operators often increase the CO2 concentrations by factors of three or four to get better growth. This is no surprise since plants and animals evolved when CO2 concentrations were about 10 times larger than they are today. Better plant varieties, chemical fertilizers and agricultural management contributed to the great increase in agricultural yields of the past century, but part of the increase almost certainly came from additional CO2 in the atmosphere.
Although the number of publicly dissenting scientists is growing, many young scientists furtively say that while they also have serious doubts about the global-warming message, they are afraid to speak up for fear of not being promoted—or worse. They have good reason to worry. In 2003, Dr. Chris de Freitas, the editor of the journal Climate Research, dared to publish a peer-reviewed article with the politically incorrect (but factually correct) conclusion that the recent warming is not unusual in the context of climate changes over the past thousand years. The international warming establishment quickly mounted a determined campaign to have Dr. de Freitas removed from his editorial job and fired from his university position. Fortunately, Dr. de Freitas was able to keep his university job.
This is not the way science is supposed to work, but we have seen it before—for example, in the frightening period when Trofim Lysenko hijacked biology in the Soviet Union. Soviet biologists who revealed that they believed in genes, which Lysenko maintained were a bourgeois fiction, were fired from their jobs. Many were sent to the gulag and some were condemned to death.
Why is there so much passion about global warming, and why has the issue become so vexing that the American Physical Society, from which Dr. Giaever resigned a few months ago, refused the seemingly reasonable request by many of its members to remove the word “incontrovertible” from its description of a scientific issue? There are several reasons, but a good place to start is the old question “cui bono?” Or the modern update, “Follow the money.”
Alarmism over climate is of great benefit to many, providing government funding for academic research and a reason for government bureaucracies to grow. Alarmism also offers an excuse for governments to raise taxes, taxpayer-funded subsidies for businesses that understand how to work the political system, and a lure for big donations to charitable foundations promising to save the planet. Lysenko and his team lived very well, and they fiercely defended their dogma and the privileges it brought them.
Speaking for many scientists and engineers who have looked carefully and independently at the science of climate, we have a message to any candidate for public office: There is no compelling scientific argument for drastic action to “decarbonize” the world’s economy. Even if one accepts the inflated climate forecasts of the IPCC, aggressive greenhouse-gas control policies are not justified economically.
A recent study of a wide variety of policy options by Yale economist William Nordhaus showed that nearly the highest benefit-to-cost ratio is achieved for a policy that allows 50 more years of economic growth unimpeded by greenhouse gas controls. This would be especially beneficial to the less-developed parts of the world that would like to share some of the same advantages of material well-being, health and life expectancy that the fully developed parts of the world enjoy now. Many other policy responses would have a negative return on investment. And it is likely that more CO2 and the modest warming that may come with it will be an overall benefit to the planet.
If elected officials feel compelled to “do something” about climate, we recommend supporting the excellent scientists who are increasing our understanding of climate with well-designed instruments on satellites, in the oceans and on land, and in the analysis of observational data. The better we understand climate, the better we can cope with its ever-changing nature, which has complicated human life throughout history. However, much of the huge private and government investment in climate is badly in need of critical review.
Every candidate should support rational measures to protect and improve our environment, but it makes no sense at all to back expensive programs that divert resources from real needs and are based on alarming but untenable claims of “incontrovertible” evidence.
Claude Allegre, former director of the Institute for the Study of the Earth, University of Paris;
J. Scott Armstrong, cofounder of the Journal of Forecasting and the International Journal of Forecasting;
Jan Breslow, head of the Laboratory of Biochemical Genetics and Metabolism, Rockefeller University;
Roger Cohen, fellow, American Physical Society;
Edward David, member, National Academy of Engineering and National Academy of Sciences;
William Happer, professor of physics, Princeton;
Michael Kelly, professor of technology, University of Cambridge, U.K.;
William Kininmonth, former head of climate research at the Australian Bureau of Meteorology;
Richard Lindzen, professor of atmospheric sciences, MIT;
James McGrath, professor of chemistry, Virginia Technical University;
Rodney Nichols, former president and CEO of the New York Academy of Sciences;
Burt Rutan, aerospace engineer, designer of Voyager and SpaceShipOne;
Harrison H. Schmitt, Apollo 17 astronaut and former U.S. senator;
Nir Shaviv, professor of astrophysics, Hebrew University, Jerusalem;
Henk Tennekes, former director, Royal Dutch Meteorological Service;
Antonio Zichichi, president of the World Federation of Scientists, Geneva.
We have witnessed something very disturbing this week. The Republican establishment which fought Ronald Reagan in the 1970s and which continues to fight the grassroots Tea Party movement today has adopted the tactics of the left in using the media and the politics of personal destruction to attack an opponent.
We will look back on this week and realize that something changed. I have given numerous interviews wherein I espoused the benefits of thorough vetting during aggressive contested primary elections, but this week’s tactics aren’t what I meant. Those who claim allegiance to Ronald Reagan’s 11th Commandment should stop and think about where we are today. Ronald Reagan and Barry Goldwater, the fathers of the modern conservative movement, would be ashamed of us in this primary. Let me make clear that I have no problem with the routine rough and tumble of a heated campaign. As I said at the first Tea Party convention two years ago, I am in favor of contested primaries and healthy, pointed debate. They help focus candidates and the electorate. I have fought in tough and heated contested primaries myself. But what we have seen in Florida this week is beyond the pale. It was unprecedented in GOP primaries. I’ve seen it before – heck, I lived it before – but not in a GOP primary race.
I am sadly too familiar with these tactics because they were used against the GOP ticket in 2008. The left seeks to single someone out and destroy his or her record and reputation and family using the media as a channel to dump handpicked and half-baked campaign opposition research on the public. The difference in 2008 was that I was largely unknown to the American public, so they had no way of differentiating between the lies and the truth. All of it came at them at once as “facts” about me. But Newt Gingrich is known to us – both the good and the bad.
4.) READ this article in the Washington Post where former Congressman J.C. Watts, who was the head of the Freddie mac watch group in the House, said that Newt never tried to influence on Freddie Mac while Watts was in the House.
#1 On Immigration – For A Path To Citizenship, Then Against:
FLIP: “Gov. Mitt Romney expressed support … for an immigration program that places large numbers of illegal residents on the path toward citizenship … Romney said illegal immigrants should have a chance to obtain citizenship.” (Evan Lehmann, “Romney Supports Immigration Program, But Not Granting ‘Amnesty’,” The Lowell Sun, 3/30/06)
FLOP: “[I] think I’m best off to describe my own positions. And my positions, I think I’ve just described for you – secure the border, employment verification and no special pathway to citizenship. I feel that’s the course we ought to take.” (CNN’s “The Situation Room,” 5/22/07)
#2 On George W. Bush’s Tax-Cuts:
FLIP: “[R]omney spoke at the 10th annual legislative conference organized by U.S. Rep. Martin T. Meehan (D-Lowell) and met with the Massachusetts delegation. … Congressional sources said that a point of contention arose when Romney refused to take a position on Bush’s massive, 10-year tax cut plan.” (Noelle Straub, “Romney Talks Policy With Bush Staffers, Mass. Delegation,” Boston Herald, 4/11/03)
FLOP: “McCain opposed President Bush’s tax cuts, Romney noted. ‘I supported them,’ the former governor said.” (Lee Bandy, “Romney Targeting McCain,” The State [SC], 2/4/07)
#3 Anti-Reagan then, now Pro-Reagan:
FLIP: “I was an independent during the time of Reagan-Bush. I’m not trying to return to Reagan- Bush,” Mitt Romney said during a debate with Ted Kennedy
FLOP: “‘Ronald Reagan is one of my heroes,’ Romney said as he praised Reagan’s strategy for winning the Cold War: ‘We win; they lose.’” (Michael Levenson, “Romney Links Gay Marriage, US Prestige,” The Boston Globe, 2/26/05)
# 4 On The National Rifle Association And Gun Laws:
FLIP: “[Romney] said he will take stands that put him at odds with some traditional ultra- conservative groups, and cited his support for the assault rifle ban and the Brady gun control law. ‘That’s not going to make me the hero of the NRA,’ he said. ‘I don’t line up with a lot of special interest groups.’” (Andrew Miga, “Mitt Rejects Right-Wing Aid,” Boston Herald, 9/23/94)
FLOP: Romney told a Derry, N.H., audience, ‘I’m after the NRA’s endorsement. I’m not sure they’ll give it to me. I hope they will. I also joined because if I’m going to ask for their endorsement, they’re going to ask for mine.’” (Glen Johnson, “Romney Calls Himself A Longtime Hunter,” The Associated Press, 4/5/07)
#5 On Whether He Even Owns A Gun (This story changed within just a few days):
FLIP: “I have a gun of my own. I go hunting myself. I’m a member of the NRA and believe firmly in the right to bear arms,” Romney said. (Glenn And Helen Show, http://www.glennandhelenshow.com, 1/10/07)
FLOP: “Asked by reporters at the gun show Friday whether he personally owned a gun, Romney said he did not. He said one of his sons, Josh, keeps two guns at the family vacation home in Utah, and he uses them ‘from time to time.’” (Scott Helman, “Romney Retreats On Gun Control,” The Boston Globe, 1/14/07)
Editor’s Note – I was a radio talk show host for much of this time and some people would send me copies of his newsletter and indeed there were parts that were antisemitic and presented strange conspiracy theories. I was repulsed by those newsletters and by similar publications such as The Spotlight. Late night talk radio and the short wave programs talked about these Newsletters from time to time so it is unlikely in the extreme that the content did not get back to him. I do consider some of Ron Paul’s views to be antisemitic, but unfortunately too many of his supporters are antisemitic as I have witnessed both online and at large GOP events where Ron Paul supporters are bused in such as CPAC.
The Republican presidential candidate has denied writing inflammatory passages in the pamphlets from the 1990s and said recently that he did not read them at the time or for years afterward. Numerous colleagues said he does not hold racist views.
But people close to Paul’s operations said he was deeply involved in the company that produced the newsletters, Ron Paul & Associates, and closely monitored its operations, signing off on articles and speaking to staff members virtually every day.
“It was his newsletter, and it was under his name, so he always got to see the final product. . . . He would proof it,’’ said Renae Hathway, a former secretary in Paul’s company and a supporter of the Texas congressman.
…
Yet a review of his enterprises reveals a sharp-eyed businessman who for nearly two decades oversaw the company and a nonprofit foundation, intertwining them with his political career. The newsletters, which were launched in the mid-1980s and bore such names as the Ron Paul Survival Report, were produced by a company Paul dissolved in 2001.
The company shared offices with his campaigns and foundation at various points, according to those familiar with the operation. Public records show Paul’s wife and daughter were officers of the newsletter company and foundation; his daughter also served as his campaign treasurer.
Jesse Benton, a presidential campaign spokesman, said that the accounts of Paul’s involvement were untrue and that Paul was practicing medicine full time when “the offensive material appeared under his name.” Paul “abhors it, rejects it and has taken responsibility for it as he should have better policed the work being done under his masthead,” Benton said. He did not comment on Paul’s business strategy.
Mark Elam, a longtime Paul associate whose company printed the newsletters, said Paul “was a busy man” at the time. “He was in demand as a speaker; he was traveling around the country,’’ Elam said in an interview coordinated by Paul’s campaign. “I just do not believe he was either writing or regularly editing this stuff.’’
Real GDP increased 1.7 percent in 2011 (that is, from the 2010 annual level to the 2011 annual level), compared with an increase of 3.0 percent in 2010.
The increase in real GDP in 2011 primarily reflected positive contributions from personal consumption expenditures (PCE), exports, and nonresidential fixed investment that were partly offset by negative contributions from state and local government spending, private inventory investment, and federal government spending. Imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, increased.
Direct payments. The amount of money the federal government hands out in direct payments to individuals steadily increased over the past four decades, but shot up under Obama, climbing by almost $600 billion — a 32% increase — in his first three years. And Obama’s last budget called for these payments to climb another $500 billion by 2016, at which point they would account for fully two-thirds of all federal spending.
People getting benefits. According to the Census Bureau 49% now live in homes where at least one person gets a federal benefit — Social Security, workers comp, unemployment, subsidized housing, and the like. That’s up from 44% the year before Obama took office, and way up from 1983, when fewer than a third were government beneficiaries.
Food stamps. This year, more than 46 million (15% of all Americans) will get food stamps. That’s 45% higher than when Obama took office, and twice as high as the average for the previous 40 years. This surge was driven in part by the recession, but also because Obama boosted the benefit amount as part of his stimulus plan.
Disability. The number of people on Social Security disability has steadily climbed since the 1970s, thanks mainly to easier eligibility rules. But their numbers jumped 10% in Obama’s first two years in office, according to the Social Security Administration. That sharp rise was due largely to meager job prospects since the recession ended in 2009. When employment opportunities are scarce, experts note, many who could otherwise work sign up for disability benefits instead.
Note both Mark Levin and Jeffery Lord worked in the Ronald Reagan Administration. This video is a MUST see.
Mini-UPDATE –
Chuck DeVore:
Very disappointed in Elliott Abrams’ unjust smear of Newt Gingrich, claiming that he was somehow opposed to Reagan in a 1986 floor speech. In 1986 I was a Reagan White House appointee in the Pentagon where I worked as a Congressional liaison in the area of defense and foreign policy. I knew Gingrich then as an ally of Reagan, not an opponent or a squishy Republican.
Newt Gingrich was at one with Ronald Reagan on values. I never heard Elliot Abrahms say the things he said about Newt – ever.
I find what Mitt and his surrogates are doing disturbing……
Mrs. Reagan and Michael Reagan insist that Newt was with Reagan the whole time. Rush Limbaugh says that he Remembers Newt Gingrich doing special orders in the House Well proclaiming Reaganism.
In fact, I’m sorry to say, what appears to be going on here is that Elliott Abrams, a considerably admirable public servant and a very smart guy, has been swept up in the GOP Establishment’s Romney frothings over the rise of Newt Gingrich in the Republican primaries. He is even being accused of trolling for a job in a Romney administration. No way!!!! Really????
What else can possibly explain a piece like the one Abrams penned on a day when Gingrich was being of a mysterious sudden targeted in one hit piece after another for his ties to Reagan? The pieces invariably following the Romney line that Newt had some version of nothing to do with Reagan.
A piece like the one Abrams wrote depends for its success in garnering headlines — which it did — by assuming no one will bother to get into the weeds and do the homework. Usually a safe assumption when dealing with the mainstream media, particularly a mainstream media that, as one with Establishment Republicans, hates Newt Gingrich.
Not so fast.
Due to the diligence of one Chris Scheve of a group called Aqua Terra Strategies in Washington, Mr. Abrams has been caught red-handed in lending himself to this attempted Romney hit job.
“Over the top rhetoric” coming from MITTENS? You’ve GOT to be KIDDING ME!
Editor:
Romney says “follow the law” that is a nice sound bite, but when Obama starts running ads saying that Romney is coming after the Latina grandma we will see Romney adopt Newt’s position real fast.
Editor:
You know, if Romney hadn’t gone hack ‘n slash ‘n lie in Iowa onward none of this would be going on like this. Newt tried to be positive but when you have millions in attack ads launched against you one has to fight back.
Now Romney says “follow the law” when it comes to illegals in the country. That is a nice sound bite, but when Obama starts running ads saying that Romney is coming after the Latina grandma we will see Romney adopt Newt’s position so fast it will make our heads spin.
While there is a degree of demagoguery going on by everyone, that one from Romney was just over the top.
Also Mitt Romney was on Meet The Press just a couple of years ago calling for amnesty and in the first debate told Rick Perry that one not be too against illegal immigration. It is maddening and why doesn’t CNN ask Mitt about that?
Chuck DeVore:
CNN Debate: Newt Gingrich: my goal is to shrink government to fit the revenue, not increase the revenue to fit the government.
Editor:
Newt: What does NASA do now that it has mismanaged itself into having no space vehicle? Does it sit down and think space? – Great!
Editor:
Santorum is going after everyone with some degree of effectiveness.
Santorum – We cannot give up this issue to Obama, this is about fundamental freedom! Santorum is right about Romney.
The issue is that RomneyCare was so inflationary that most of the private guys fled the state.
Go Rick Go!! That is absolutely right and the study [that talks about the expense of RomneyCare] is on my web site! – LINK
Editor:
Almost every question Wolf asks keeps Obama out of criticism……..and when Santorum went after Obama it was “Move on….”
Good answer from Mitt Romney on Israel/Palestine.
Final Thoughts:
Romney had a good night, but make no mistake, he is trying to be above the fray while his surrogates smear everyone and if Rick Santorum does well in Florida he will be next.
Newt was unwise to go after Mitt on the Freddie/Fannie stock. Millions of people had those stocks….. Who the heck is his communications team?
I didn’t ask for a neat and tidy campaign, I am asking for something a little less revolting… I can play rough. But destroying the Republican Party in the process is not a great plan going into the general as evidenced by the fact that Obama’s poll numbers are up three points in the last two weeks… this kind of smear crap damages the entire Republican brand and Mitt doesn’t care.
That is bad for the general, but that also says something about what his leadership style will be, it is ALL about HIM.
Newt was unwise to go after Mitt on the Freddie/Fannie stock. Millions of people had those stocks….. Who the heck is his communications team? I would never have made such a mistake.Newt should fire his comm director and hire me.
The first time Obama nails Mitt with “You will send ICE after Latina grandmothers” Mitt will adopt Newt’s position so fast it will make our head’s spin. And really all, that exchange on what to do about illegals is SO indicative of these two men. Newt is absolutely right. Mitt can say “Just follow the law” and you know… that sounds so nice. It is so easy to say. Well Speaker Gingrich understands full well the difference between the law and the law applied.
Of course so does Mitt Romney and that shows how incredibly disingenuous he is. I could not do what Mitt did and look in the eyes of my kids at night.
Just remember what this picture did to Bill Clinton and Janet Reno… I guarantee you David Axelrod will use something similar against Mitt Romney and he will lose the Hispanic vote just like that…
“I sure am….he is not the only one vilified, though, look at Newt Gingrich, what’s going on with him, via the establishment’s attacks. They’re trying to crucify this man and rewrite history, and rewrite what it is that he has stood for all these years. It’s not just Ron Paul. I believe it is also Newt Gingrich that the establishment, that the liberal media, certainly that the progressives and Democrats don’t like.”
Obama sugar daddy #2 Warren Buffet, who says that the rich should pay more while Obama demands increases in a tax that the super rich don’t even pay, but small and medium sized businesses do… well Buffet not only goes to great lengths to shield his money from taxes, but he owes almost a billion dollars – LINK.
Sabra Feldman:
Instead of complaining about tax cuts for the “wealthiest Americans” or not, why not set up a voluntary tax for the “wealthiest Americans”? Then, the government can track which of the wealthiest Americans, particularly Obama’s wealthiest supporters, are willing to pay it.
“When we were doing the debates Newt and I used to talk and we could relate and I would listen to what he would say and I listened to what Romney would say. I would say Newt is definitely closer to Reagan,”
The biggest problem that Mitt Romney has is that the arguments in favor of his candidacy have been paper thin and largely circular.
He’s the “most electable” candidate because his supporters keep saying he’s the most electable. He’s “inevitable” because his supporters say he’s inevitable. “He’ll be conservative in office” despite governing as a moderate because his supporters say he’ll be conservative in office.
None of these arguments hold up under a bare minimum of scrutiny. Mitt has lost 2 of 3 major races he’s run so far (His record would have been 1-4 if he had run for governor again in 2006), he’s only won 1 out of 3 primaries up until this point despite having every advantage, he’s only pulling about 30% of the vote nationally, and there’s no reason at all to think that a guy who’s famous for shifting his positions would suddenly turn into Ronald Reagan once he gets into office.
Moreover, it’s hard not to notice the double standard that’s been going on during the primary. Every candidate in the field who pulls ahead of Mitt gets savaged by the mainstream media and his allies in the conservative press, while Mitt hasn’t even had a basic vetting. Furthermore, when Mitt bombed Newt into the ground with vicious negative ads in Iowa, despite the fact that Newt had been running a positive campaign, we were told, “Politics ain’t beanbag.” On the other hand, when the remaining candidates gave Mitt the same treatment he had dished out after New Hampshire, this was supposed to be some sort of unconscionable attack on capitalism that was hurting the guaranteed winner of the primaries. That’s horseflop.
Given that Ted Kennedy beat Mitt in 1994 with attacks on Bain Capital, how ridiculous is it that the most basic questions about his time there still hadn’t been brought up and perhaps worse yet, that Romney still doesn’t seem to have particularly good answers for some of those questions?
Senator John Kerry (D., Mass.) is in Egypt, meeting with leaders of the Muslim Brotherhood — the Islamist organization whose goals are to destroy Israel, “conquer Europe” and “conquer America” (to quote its most influential jurist, Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi).
The Brotherhood, which operates throughout the world, seeks the imposition by governments of strict sharia law (as outlined in Reliance of the Traveller: A Classic Manual of Islamic Sacred Law) and, eventually, a global caliphate. Naturally, the Obama administration describes it as a “largely secular” and moderate organization — and William Taylor, President Obama’s hand-picked “special coordinator for transitions in the Middle East,” announced last month that the administration would be quite “satisfied” with a Brotherhood victory in the Egyptian elections.
As the Investigative Project on Terrorism reports, Kerry, the 2004 Democratic presidential nominee and key Obama administration congressional ally, “welcomed the results of Egypt’s first democratic elections,” in which “voters gave the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) nearly 40% of seats, and more than 24% went to the ultra-conservative Salafi coalition led by al-Nour Party.” [ACM: byultraconservative, IPT means al-Nour is somewhat more impatient than the Brotherhood for the imposition of supremacist Islam; as I’ve explained on otheroccasions, the Muslim Brotherhood is Salafist in its ideology.]
In addition to praising the Brotherhood’s election as a model of transparency and integrity, Sen. Kerry also called for an infusion of cash from the International Monetary Fund to undergird Egypt’s new Islamist government.
The money quote…literally:
Here’s a quote from the article linked here: “United States, though over $15 trillion in debt, is the leading contributor-nation to the IMF, providing close to a fifth of its funding. That is about three times as much as second-place Japan, more than four times as much as China, more than six times as much as the leading Islamist country (Saudi Arabia), and more than the combined contributions of the three top European donors — Germany, Britain and France. (See Wikipedia Table, here.) Consequently, a cash infusion by the IMF to the Brotherhood-led Egyptian government would be a redistribution of wealth from American taxpayers to Islamists whose goal is to conquer American taxpayers — assuming, of course, there is any money left in the IMF after the Obama administration gets done using it as the device through which tapped out American taxpayers bail out, at least temporarily, Europe’s collapsing experiment in trans-continental socialism.”
Given all the attention to the ethics matter, it’s worth asking what actually happened back in 1995, 1996, and 1997. The Gingrich case was extraordinarily complex, intensely partisan, and driven in no small way by a personal vendetta on the part of one of Gingrich’s former political opponents. It received saturation coverage in the press; a database search of major media outlets revealed more than 10,000 references to Gingrich’s ethics problems during the six months leading to his reprimand. It ended with a special counsel hired by the House Ethics Committee holding Gingrich to an astonishingly strict standard of behavior, after which Gingrich in essence pled guilty to two minor offenses. Afterwards, the case was referred to the Internal Revenue Service, which conducted an exhaustive investigation into the matter. And then, after it was all over and Gingrich was out of office, the IRS concluded that Gingrich did nothing wrong. After all the struggle, Gingrich was exonerated.
“If you are not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed and loving the people who are doing the oppressing.” – Malcolm X
Political Arena 