…let’s just concentrate on getting the Hispanic vote!

In a CNN debate in Austin, Texas, Democratic presidential candidates Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton agreed Thursday night that the Secure Border Fence Act of 2006, which directs the secretary of Homeland Security to construct 700 miles of double border fencing along specific sections of the U.S.-Mexico border, should not be enforced as written.

Stressing her desire to be deferential to the views of people who live along the border in Texas — which on March 4 will hold a primary that is widely viewed as a must-win event for the New York senator — Clinton said of a border fence, “there may be limited places where it would work. But let’s deploy more technology and personnel, instead of the physical barrier.”

“This is an area where Senator Clinton and I almost entirely agree,” said Obama. “I think that the key is to consult with local communities, whether it’s on the commercial interests or the environmental stakes of creating any kind of barrier.”

Both Clinton and Obama argued that the Bush administration was being too aggressive in pushing to build the border fence mandated by the 2006 law.

By “too aggressive”, they surely mean “verbally” aggressive. How much fence have they built in the last year and a half?

The agreement among the senators came in response to a question asked by CNN’s John King, one of the moderators of the debate.

On September 29, 2006, the Senate voted 80-19 for passage of H.R. 6061, the Secure Fence Act of 2006. (It passed the House on September 14, 2006, by a vote of 283-138). Clinton and Obama both voted for the act.

The law mandated that the secretary of Homeland Security build more than 700 miles of double fencing along specific segments of the U.S.-Mexico. Then House Homeland Security Chairman Peter King (R.-N.Y.), the principal sponsor of the law, explained its purpose in a floor speech on the day of the 2006 House vote. “It provides over 700 miles of two-layered reinforced fencing,” King said, according to the Congressional Record.

Above emphasis mine.

All 435 members of the House of Representatives and one third of U.S. senators faced reelection contests just one month after passage of the Secure Fence Act.

Yeah, sure… Voting for the bill was one thing, especially before an election, while actually allocating the funding to see it to fruition, after the election, is another thing entirely.

While Obama apparently has the black vote sewn up, he and Hillary are still vying for the Hispanic vote, yet neither wants to dumpsterize the vote of those favoring the enforcement of our immigration laws, so they offer straw-grasping alternatives neither would actually embrace, once elected, to the legislation they themselves voted for, in order to wear both hats.

That either specimen is actually a seriously considered candidate for leader of the free world is a telling example of how little today’s Democrats value even an iota of honesty in their political choices. But then, that became abundantly clear when they re-elected Bill Clinton.

Now that Channukah, Christmas and New Year’s have come and gone and I’ve recovered sufficiently from a rather active New Year’s Eve to take a poke at this keyboard again with some semblance of coherence…

First, being a smoker, I need to pitch a brief bitch about the no-smoking-in-bars law that was moved up from this coming summer to the day before yesterday (1 January, 2008) here in Illinois. I read all these pieces about fellow smokers facing the tribulations of having to step outside the bar, into the Chicago winter (if I’m not mistaken, it’s less than 10 degrees outside as I type this), to smoke a cigarette. They speak of everything from purchasing ear muffs and extra scarves to giving up the tobacco habit.

For me, this just means I won’t go to any bars other than those in restaurants where I’m having dinner with friends, and I’ll abstain until after I leave the establishment. I simply won’t hang out at my favorite watering hole any more, or any other local drinkeries, for that matter. So I’ll save a couple of hundred bucks a week.

Then there’s this other law that kinda’ sorta’ went into effect without my even knowing about it: I noticed, over the duration of my last carton of Chesterfield Kings, that the durn things kept going out on me when I laid them in the ashtray (more of my cigarettes spend time in the ashtray than they do being smoked, as I light up most while I’m on-line, blogging, reading, commenting, etc). It seemed that there was a problem with the paper — so I called Phillip Morris to inquire, and they informed me that certain states (including Illinois) had adopted a law requiring that all cigarettes sold in them had to have the paper thickened so that they go out when they’re not being smoked. This was explained as a measure to prevent cigarettes from starting fires. Right. Okay. Whatever. I search-engined the law and read all the statistics. Fine. Ram it.

It’s sure nice to have government entities, be they local, state or federal, protecting us from ourselves. I mean, what would we do without intrusive government? Let’s make things really easy: Let’s simply shitcan the Constitution altogether. Who needs it, right? Today’s politicians apparently haven’t read it, anyway, so why bother to perpetuate its existence?

Having gotten that out of the way, let’s move on to the meat of this post:

Just like that–like flipping a switch–Congress and the president banned incandescent light bulbs last month. OK, they did not exactly ban them. But the energy bill passed by Congress and signed by President Bush sets energy-efficiency standards for light bulbs that traditional incandescent bulbs cannot meet.

The new rules phase in starting in 2012, but don’t be lulled by that five-year delay. Whether it’s next week or next decade, you will one day walk into a hardware store looking for a 100-watt bulb–and there won’t be any. By 2014, the new efficiency standards will apply to 75-watt, 60-watt and 40-watt bulbs too.

So now the government is dictating what kind of light bulbs will be available to us, cost be damned.

As a disclaimer, I will say that I use compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs) for the simple reason that I dislike pedestrian hassles, especially being a high ceilings kind of guy, and the spiral bulbs mean not having to change a light bulb for a really long time.

However, I don’t believe that CFLs should be forced on the public, like it or not. They are significantly more expensive, for one thing, and for another, as was bandied about the Blogosphere several months ago, they bring a serious element of risk into the household.

Brandy Bridges heard the claims of government officials, environmentalists and retailers like Wal-Mart all pushing the idea of replacing incandescent light bulbs with energy-saving and money-saving compact fluorescent lamps.

So, last month, the Prospect, Maine, resident went out and bought two dozen CFLs and began installing them in her home. One broke. A month later, her daughter’s bedroom remains sealed off with plastic like the site of a hazardous materials accident, while Bridges works on a way to pay off a $2,000 estimate by a company specializing in environmentally sound cleanups of the mercury inside the bulb.

With everyone from Al Gore to Wal-Mart to the Environmental Protection Agency promoting CFLs as the greatest thing since, well, the light bulb, consumers have been left in the dark about a problem they will all face eventually – how to get rid of the darn things when they burn out or, worse yet, break.

So here we’re talking about government regulation requiring families and individuals to purchase and install in their dwellings common objects (unless, of course, they have no problem with living in the dark) that present potential health hazards.

Now, I’m not a litigious person, but…

… if the government can impose this upon the masses, then the masses should, by all means, be able to sue the government, big time, in the event that these CFLs, once they’re the only game in town, present the problem they did for Brandy Bridges. Instead of the citizen with no remaining freedom of choice paying for the clean-up, let Uncle Sam pay for it. After all, Uncle is forcing the situation on us, and doing so by ignoring the Constitution and the very principles of freedom that our founding fathers bestowed upon us.

…to legislate surrender in Iraq?

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced on Thursday that she will bring another troops-out-of-Iraq bill to the House floor on Friday.

It will be the 58th “politically motivated” bill on the Iraq war by the House and Senate this year, Republicans complained.

The Fifty Eighth!

Now, I may sound a bit partisan here, but repeated failure seems to be a recurring theme among the folks over there on the left side of the aisle. I mean, they embrace socialism… despite its extreme lack of success in every government that has adopted it over the years… and they want to force it on the rest of us, here in America, marketing it as “freebies” for all.

So this 58 business, while lending new meaning to the old adage “if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again”, is also somewhat embarrassing to me, as an American, despite the fact that it comes from the left, which is as indictable as El Nino once was in its own milieu, for all sorts of problems.

Foreign media report on our Congressional activities, simply because the United States is what it is in the world, and a Congress that spends most of its time trying to disrupt the CIC during a time when American troops are in harm’s way demeans the image of America and our political system (think all us voters, who put these people in office).

Fifty Eight failed attempts by the majority on the Hill to surrender to terrorism must make us look pretty lame.

“We are restating the differentiation between us and the president of the United States,” Pelosi said at a press conference. “This gives voice to the desires of the American people,” she said of the bill, which ties war funding ($50 billion for four months) to an immediate troop withdrawal.

Right, they are “re-stating” the differentiation, etc, etc…

Liberals will be liberals.

These are people who will sink in quicksand to protest an anti-quicksand policy and wonder, as they begin to smother (ooops! too late!), if it was a worthwhile cause.

However, I digress…

The 58 surrender attempts have all had one thing in common: They all happened on the taxpayer’s dime. What Pelosi blatantly admitted in that single short paragraph was that the Democrats have no problem with flogging a dead horse on our time and money to press a political agenda.

Try being as unproductive in a salaried private sector job and see how soon you encounter the need to edit your resume.

House Republican Whip Roy Blunt (Mo.) criticized Democrats for refusing to recognize the important of the U.S. military mission as well as the “tremendous progress we’ve made against all odds in capturing and killing agents of terror, and providing a level of security for political reconciliation to take place.

“This bill is deja-vu all over again,” Blunt said. “The last time Democrats tried to tie funding for our troops to a date for surrender, they failed - and that was before the marked turn-around we’ve witnessed on the ground over the past several months.”

Truncating…

On Wednesday, the New York Times reported that American forces have routed Al Qaeda in Iraq from every neighborhood of Baghdad, according to a top American general - “allowing American troops involved in the ’surge’ to depart as planned.”

Which brings us to this:

The upbeat assessment from the New York Times and other major newspapers had some Republicans questioning the Democrats’ timing:

Blunt said the House on Friday would be taking up a bill “that has far less to do with building on our continued progress, and far more to do with pandering to their (Democrats’) base.”

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) issued a statement on Thursday questioning the continuing Democratic push for a troop withdrawal.

“What unfortunate timing for Democrats, announcing yet another attempt at a withdrawal date on a day when the papers are filled with encouraging news from Iraq,” McConnell said.

President Bush vetoed a bill tying war funding to a troop withdrawal in May, and he undoubtedly would do so again, given the chance. Some troops withdrawal bills, facing the prospect of a presidential veto, have not mustered enough support to pass the Senate.

So what it all boils down to is that the Democrats have so little regard for our tax dollars or for the Will Of The People that they’ve got absolutely no problem with wasting the time and the resources of the American People by squandering two years of a Congressional majority performing the Kiss of Shame on the far left.

Fifty Eight (count ‘em, 58!) attempts to surrender to the anti-thesis of our very civilization, “Paid for by the Democratic Party”.

…This past week began with another one of those ambushes beginning in “…could you please…we really, really need…” and continuing along with a deadline-oriented project that consisted of writing a short but time-and-thought-consuming manual. To put things simply, whenever I freed up a little time to post, I was, to all intents and purposes, brain-dead.

So Friday, after Fed-Exing the finished product to the client, I determined to simply relax for a day (Saturday), get my head together, so to speak, watch a few DVDs and cook myself a humongous rib-eye from the best butcher shop in Chicago, accompanied by pasta with a jar-originated sauce — anyone who occasionally (or always) takes the shortcut of using pre-made pasta sauces might try Mezzetta’s Napa Valley Bistro brands, they make every other brand I’ve ever sampled pale to insignificance — that wasn’t a paid advertisement, it was a free endorsement from a devoted fan. A spinach salad with lots of grape tomatoes and Marie’s Creamy Italian Garlic dressing and about half a bottle of chiante classico rounded things out rather well…

I watched Casablanca, The Maltese Falcon (I am a major Humphrey Bogart fan, and especially enjoy the films he made with Peter Lorre and Sidney Greenstreet) a few Dean Martin Celebrity Roasts and Dean Martin Variety Show episodes and, conversely, a totally insane Rob Zombie gorefest called House Of 1,000 Corpses.

Having said all that, one of the most disconcerting, though not at all surprising in the Track Records Department bits of news I’ve read in the last few days was about Condoleeza Rice consulting with Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter in order to “benefit” from their Middle East Peace Talks experience.

Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot!!!?

What is she thinking?

Both of those administrations were failures in the Israeli/”Palestinian” arena, accomplishing nothing save for increased violence with a backdrop of Israel making mounds of concessions while the “Palestinians” honored none of their side of any agreements made.

Adding to that, Carter’s proven himself quite the anti-Israel lobbyist over the last few years.

George W. Bush’s “Roadmap” secured the release of beaucoup terrorists from Israeli prisons and subsequently resulted in Israel ceding territory to the “Palestinians”, territory the Arabs began utilizing, right off the bat, as launching platforms for terrorist attacks against Israel.

Every single “peace” accord in which we engage over there has identical results: Israel compromises more of her security and cedes more territory and the “Palestinians” gain additional one-way concessions.

Now Jerusalem has been thrown into the mix of diplomatic consideration.

Our (U.S.) involvement in the Israel-”Palestinian” relationship is a paradox: On one hand, we finance much of Israel’s self-defense capability via hundreds of millions of dollars, on the other hand we cripple Israel on the political/diplomatic stage.

Our diplomatic offerings over there are the epitome of profound idiocy.

Either we support Israel or we don’t.

I was a 100% supportive of Condi when she was first appointed. Her approach to the Israel/”Palestinian” millieu has changed my mind entirely.

We’re looking at a typical political appointee in a typical politics-first scenario: Support Israel with the right hand while allowing it to be gradually eroded and eventually destroyed by the left hand.

A column by Wesley Pruden (an icon of mine) gives a good example of those among my fellow Jews who have, unfortunately in large quantities, listed too far to port.

If at first you don’t succeed in making friends with a neighbor who’s forever dreaming of killing you, try again. If that doesn’t work, cry “mea culpa.” Then call your lawyer and make sure your will is up to date.

The notion that trusting your enemies against all evidence to the contrary is the most stubborn liberal pipe dream. If you wish upon a star hard enough, hold hands tight enough and sing kumbaya loud enough, dreams come true.

Right, as we once said, On!

Yosef Kanefsky, a prominent Orthodox Jewish rabbi in Los Angeles, detonated a fierce debate among Jews and their Christian allies here last week with his argument that maybe the insoluble, intractable standoff in the Middle East is the result of lies, or at least stretchers, told by Jews and evangelical Christians. And a few little white fibs told by misguided Muslims. A good place for repentance to start is to divide Jerusalem.

“The question of whether we could bear a redivision of Jerusalem is a searing and painful one,” he wrote in a provocative essay in the Jewish Journal of Los Angeles. “The Orthodox Union, National Council of Young Israel and a variety of other organizations, Christian Evangelical ones, are calling upon their constituencies to join them in urging the Israeli government to refrain from any negotiation concerning the status of Jerusalem at all, when and if the Annapolis [peace] conference occurs. …

“It’s not that I would want to see Jerusalem divided. It’s rather that the time has come for honesty. … [T]hese organizations are not being honest about the situation that we are in, and how it came about. And I cannot support them in this.”

Oh, yeah, as in almost every other venue in this cockamamie era, idiots are taking over. The rabbis who most figured into my much younger years were Boxer (deceased) and Spar, who Bar-Mitzva’d me. Both were conservatives, both religiously and politically.

Along came the liberals, introducing “reform” Judaism. Moral convenience over the laws set down in the Torah. Don’t stray too far while looking for comparable examples, just examine the Democrats here in the U.S. of A. Here, they simply do away with references to G-d altogeter and, in the same vein, treat the Constitution the way Reform Jews regard the Old Testament.

The fact that Kanefsky is an Orthodox Jew truly makes me wonder why he’s in the dhimmi camp rather than the Kahane camp.

Well, the rabbi, like the rest of us, at least in the West, is entitled. But it’s difficult to see how giving your enemies a “mea culpa” is a smart bargaining position when those enemies devoutly believe that with only a little more pressure you’ll cave. Rabbi Kanefsky goes further:

“No peace conference between Israel and the Palestinians will ever produce anything positive until both sides have decided to read the story of the last 40 years honestly. On our side, this means being honest about the story of how Israel came to settle civilians in the territories it conquered in 1967, and about the outcomes that this story has generated.”

This is the well-meant goodwill gesture that Israel’s enemies will take for an admission that the Palestinian radicals were right all along, that the Jews are as perfidious as the Islamic radicals have been saying they are, and their Crusader allies are just as bad. Conceding half of Jerusalem for nothing in return would further embolden the Palestinians to scorn the half-loaf when they can soon get the bakery

Nevertheless, the rabbi’s remarks are taken very seriously indeed. Several of his rabbinical colleagues praised his “bravery” and “courage,” though it’s not clear what bravery and courage have to do with anything, since rabbis, like Christian pastors, generally do not fear the beheadings, firebombings and similar tools of doctrinal suppression often employed in certain other places.

Mid-East (Israel, “Palestinian”) peace is a major political focus of every U.S. Government administration, be it Democrat or Republican.

Realistically, we should simply step aside and allow the Israelis and the Arabs to settle their differences. Every time we get involved, we kill more Israelis.

It’s not that our politicians and diplomats are ill intentioned, it’s just that they’re either naive, stupid or a combination of the two. Sort of like Rabbi Kanefsky.

I would really like to see Condi stand toe-to-toe with Abbas and say in level tones, “You folks never honor the obligations you assume in the course of these peace accords, yet you screech the second you don’t think Israel has honored theirs to the fullest extent to which you can milk them. You are not an honorable people. Until you have proven otherwise and civilized yourselves in the process, you will not receive a dime of U.S. largesse.”

Instead, she (and by extension, the administration) prefers to show us how lost she is on that front by consulting the architects of previous failure.

We are supposedly Israel’s friend — with a friend like us, who needs enemies?

…it’s that no matter what happens, any and every solution the Democrats will devise to any and every problem will be based upon raising taxes.

Rep. John Dingell (D-Mich.), chairman of the House Energy & Commerce Committee, is proposing a new carbon tax to reduce U.S. energy consumption. Part of the proceeds, he said would help pay for “universal health care — “upon passage,” he noted.

Dingell, here, wants not only to raise taxes, but also to create a new tax to pile on to those we already pay. A “carbon tax”.

But he’s not finished!

In addition to the carbon tax, Dingell’s plan to reduce global warming also includes higher taxes on gasoline; and a phase-out of the mortgage interest deduction on what he called “McMansions.”

If that’s not enough, he’s holding free reign on the as yet unproven concept of man-made global warming.

Yeah, yeah, we know — Dingleberry and his ilk ignore the scientists who employ actual science to refute the man-made “climate change” theories that are based totally upon politics rather than science, so…

“The earth is getting warmer and human activities are a large part of the cause,” Dingell said. “We need to act in order to prevent a serious problem.”

Dingell admits that reducing greenhouse gas emissions will be a “massive undertaking,” but he believes higher taxes and fees are “the most effective way” to solve the problem.

Dingell said he would levy an additional 50-cents-a-gallon tax on gasoline, jet fuel, kerosene, to be phased in over five years and then adjusted for inflation.

Boy, it must be nice to be able to simply pile on the taxes and restructure the Constitution at the same time. After all, the end result of this idiot’s agenda will be a socialist state to replace the present structure of the United States Government — Ding has already decided that socialized medicine is a done deal, so…

Where will the revenue go?

“First and foremost, the Earned Income Tax Credit will be expanded,” Dingell said on his website. He said the higher EIC (a tax refund for poor people who don’t pay taxes) will help lower income families compensate for the increased taxes on fuels.

Dingell said the money raised by the higher gasoline tax would go into a highway trust fund, with 40 percent going to mass transit and 60 percent going to roads. (The revenue from the tax on jet fuel would go into the airport and airway trust fund.)

Finally, Dingell said the revenue from his proposed fee on carbon emissions - the carbon tax - would go into the following accounts: Medicare and Social Security; Universal Healthcare (upon passage); State Children’s Health Insurance Program; Conservation
Renewable Energy Research and Development; Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program.

.

This is such a Democrat issue: Employ junk science as a basis for dumping large new tonnages of taxes on the American people while shoving our government in the direction of a political philosophy that is 180 degrees in opposition of the Law of the Land upon which our great and hitherto profoundly successful nation has been based from its founding.

To take things a step further, the politics advocated by the Democrats represent the cornerstones of those governments that have been our sworn enemies and collective anti-thesis over the last century.

Socialists. National Socialists. Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

These folks simply don’t understand even the most fundamental reasons why we broke away from England in the latter part of the 1700s, why our great Constitution says what it says or why the United States of America is boss trump in the global arena.

We are.

Even when we read about the citizens of foreign countries opposing us via demonstrations and so forth, we can understand that the reason they’re bitching is that we’re the boss — we possess the factors that make any entity existing within the boundaries of humanity boss: We are both economically and militarily superior to the rest of the world. When America makes a move, it is felt across the globe. That’s the way it is.

We don’t simply sit on our riches and/or our military might, we share both. The Democrats find fault in the latter. They found fault in our protecting the South Vietnamese from communism and they find fault in our attempts to introduce democracy to the Arab world. They would prefer to surrender.

If the Democrats are so dedicated to the options of

a) living under Sha’aria law or

b) being beheaded

that’s their lookout.

If the Democrats are so dedicated to taxing us to death

that’s a good reason to vote otherwise

If the Democrats are so willing to transform us into a socialist country

that’s a spectacular reason to do away with their party.

‘Nuff said.

…or wait ’til later?

Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) on Thursday blamed the Republican minority for sinking congressional approval ratings, calling recent poll results “a referendum on Republican obstructionism.” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) blamed President Bush.

Schumer told reporters that Republicans - who earlier this week blocked a Democratic amendment that would have mandated a troop withdrawal from Iraq, and who in June blocked a comprehensive immigration reform bill - are frustrating Americans who are hungry for change.

That is hilarious!

From the time George W. Bush took his first oath of office as President of these here United States, the Democrats have aggressively obstructed his every agenda, with the notable exception of the amnesty bill a couple of weeks ago, a shared interest of the White House and the Democrats. Even now, they’re in hot pursuit of his nominee for Surgeon General, fighting any chance of confirmation tooth and nail — the Surgeon General for G-d’s sake, an almost entirely ceremonial position!

And all this purely in the name of partisan politics, screw the interests, will and even the safety of the American people.

Since winning the Congressional majority, they’ve thrown almost every iota of effort into continuing to attack Bush and the Republican Party, seeking subpoenas and indictments at every turn for invented transgressions, and continuously hammering away at their cut-n-run ambitions for Iraq. Otherwise, they have made little effort to do the job they are payed to do, that of governing the nation.

Now that their chickens have come home to roost in the form of performance poll results that border on a no-confidence vote, they have the chutzpah to whine that the Republicans (and of course Bush, for whom they always save some blame) are “obstructing” them. It’s all the GOP’s (and Bush’s) fault!

They cite two cases:

The Republicans’ steadfast refusal to support the Democrats’ Iraq surrender agenda and the Republicans’ steadfast refusal to grant amnesty to twenty million criminals who are trespassing in our country.

“The American people are demanding change,” Schumer said. “The one thing standing in the way is the Republicans in the Senate.”

HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Idiot!

…is, as the Bard might have said, much ado about nothing.

The MSM and much alternative media as well promote the information czar turned New York mayor’s quitting the Republican Party as a significant event. Right, sure, um… it’s, er, truly an epic event.

Bah!

That’s right, Bah!

Bloomberg was a staunch Democrat prior to the N.Y. mayoral elections at the end of the Giuliani years. However, the Democrats already had a candidate. Really determined to be the mayor, Bloomberg went the turncoat rout and “became” a Republican for the sole purpose of running for mayor. He won.

His first move as the new Republican mayor was to revert to a Democrat, big time.

Now that he’s in the twilight stages of his second term, he no longer needs to be a “Republican”.

The headlines shouldn’t read, Bloomberg Leaves GOP, they should say, Hizzoner Casts Off Sheep’s Clothing.

Now the speculation begins: “Will Bloomberg make a run for President in 2008?”

The media and assorted pundits make reference to his $5.5 billion smackers, wondering if he will use a chunk of it to campaign for POTUS.

And then the wishful thinking makes its way to columns, blogs and broadcast — if he runs as an Independent, his candidacy will be good for, depending upon the commentator, the Democrats or the Republicans.

Now, all opinions are based upon the fact that he won’t win the general election, but that he’ll take votes away from one of the two major parties, like a major league Ralph Nader.

I am not a wishful thinker. Though I’m not always right, I tend to base my opinions and/or projections on what I view as reality based on evidence, human nature, track records, real circumstances, etc, etc. As often as not, I find myself at odds with fellow conservatives who continue to have faith in the integrity of today’s politicians while I reserve judgement under an umbrella of doubt based upon the “bitter pill” of experience.

Personally, as a conservative I would welcome a Bloomberg campaign.

He is for gun control, he is pro-”choice”, he is for stem cell research and other Democrat themes. He certainly wouldn’t get any votes from conservatives or true Republicans.

He would, however, get a lot of votes from moderate Democrats who mistakenly view Bloomberg as a conservative possessed of “progressive” ideals. With or without Nader running, the billionaire, with his monetary edge, would suck up Democrat votes like an aardvark with a Dyson tromping through ant country.

So sure, let the schmuck run for President. His loss would be America’s gain.

And here we have a sterling, totally blatant example of liberal hypocrisy in its finest hour, courtesy of none other than John Edwards, our former Vice Presidential candidate.

According to such cartoon characters as Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats, should they manage to get enough of their fellow travellers elected so as to have a majority in the House of Representatives, with Pelosi expected to become Speaker of the House (well, Halloween is almost upon us, so what’s a good scare among friends?), one of the first priorities of the Democrats will be to stamp out the Bush tax cuts and roll back our taxes to 1990s levels.

If I were an enemy of the state, I would utterly destroy my hands applauding this ambition. Unfortunately, I am a patriot who loves America, to say nothing of the fact that I am also an American who lives and pays taxes here, so I must convey the blatant fact that I am not a fan of this intended tax increase.

I understand the Democrats’ need to tax me into the ground. Well, not exactly understand it, per se, but I realize that the Democrats have a serious problem with their fellow Americans being able to keep some of the money they earn and are fixated on the concept of raising taxes whenever the opportunity presents itself.

Some people are into sky diving, some people collect butterflies, some people are passionate stamp collectors, some people love archery, some tennis, some throwing rocks at passing cars, some surfing porn websites, some collecting sea shells, some climbing trees, others mountains…. Democrats are into raising taxes. It’s what they do, just as sucking blood is what mosquitos do, or what leeches do.

It’s not their fault, it’s simply who they are.

They particularly like to tax those who are successful, like the rich and like large, prosperous corporations, and are very much like Robin Hood — they take from the rich, and give to the poor. It makes them feel good — hell, it makes them feel great — stripping a big company of its investment capital plunges them into ecstasy.

Back in the 1980s, during the Reagan Administration, the greatest President in my lifetime stopped the bloodsucking practice of penalizing American business for its success, allowing it to keep its investment capital in order to put it to work, and lo and behold, despite the Democrats’ criticism of what they fondly referred to as Reaganomics, our economy exploded into a dynamo of successful professionals, low unemployment, newly created millionaires and prosperous companies.

This trend continued through the Bush 1 Administration, but then, alas and alack, American voters sent Bill Clinton, a Democrat, off to the White House.

Keeping to the sacred tradition of Democrats, he raised taxes, as usual targeting the rich.

Before the end of his second term (he was actually reelected, go figure!), we were plunged into recession. The unemployment rate soared, businesses struggling to stay afloat transferred record amounts of their production to outsourced labor pools and after Algore, Clinton’s Veep, lost the 2000 presidential election to George W. Bush, the newly elected President engendered massive tax cuts.

Naturally the Democrats, dismayed that Americans were being permitted to keep more of their earnings, mounted yet another of their innumerable bumper-sticker friendly campaigns — “The Republicans have given tax cuts to the rich, screwing the poor as always!”

That was worth, at the very least, a good chuckle, since every American taxpayer was entitled to the cuts. The Democrats somehow managed, once realizing that they really couldn’t produce any low income working folks who were being either neglected or recieving the fid, cited poor people on welfare and other premature social security venues who weren’t benefiting from the tax cuts, the fact that these people didn’t pay any income tax to begin with notwithstanding… they actually forced the government to give something “back” to these noncontributors as well.

Meanwhile, the tax cuts enabled corporate America and smaller business people to use the “surplus” equity to expand existing business and create new enterprises.

The result has been a major rebound in our economy and a serious decrease in the unemployment rate that is still adjusting downward. America is again flourishing!

But let’s not be too confident, friends, okay? We still haven’t had this year’s elections, so we don’t actually know where we stand.

We’re pretty confident about holding a Republican majority in the Senate, but there has been a lot of negative conjecture regarding the House majority after 7 November. Personally, I believe we’ll hold our majority there, as well, though we’ll have a few less seats.

But…

Should the Democrats gain a majority in the House Of Representatives, they will raise taxes, and you can bet your bottom dollar, assuming you still have one, that the late 1990s recession will return even more quickly than it went away.

Of course, the Democrats will find a way to blame Bush….

Tony Snow’s latest column, “Cowardice, not corruption, plaguing GOPers” is very much on point, even in the White House but more particularly on the Hill.

The Republican Party in Washington is in trouble not because it’s overrun by crooks, but because it’s packed with cowards — and has degenerated into a caricature of the party that swept to power 11 years ago promising to take on the federal bureaucracy and liberate the creative genius of American society.

We see this constantly. Here we are with an overwhelming Republican majority in Congress, a formidable state of affairs that our right-thinking politicians should be using to advance the Republican cause and back the President when he nominates strong Republicans to such positions as judges in the higher courts and to ambassadorship in the U.N., et al. They should be supporting the administration on Iraq and the rest of the Global War On Terror.

Instead, these spineless, self-serving career senators and representatives Frenchly allow themselves to be browbeaten and bullied into submission by the liberal-led Democrat minority, as often as not leaving the President and his advisors hanging out in the breeze, lone-wolfing the defense of their policies and nominees on their lonesome, weathering blistering, patently false or twisted rhetoric from the left, while not even a cricket chirps from the right side of the aisle.

That’s because it’s more important to these Republicans to remain popular, looking to be reelected rather than to risk losing an election by doing what we elected and reelected them to do, what we pay them to do.

Do we really need to reelect these people? In my opinion, it’s about time for a good house cleaning at the polls, transfusing Congress with fresh blood to replace the complacent, fat assed, pusilanimous tax dollar parasites with newbies who stand for more than just being reelected.

Ann Coulter gives some succinct examples of Republican politicians’ arse creeping in their response to John Murtha’s cowardly cut and run redeployment proposal. It’s enough to turn your stomach.

The old Reagan quote about politics being the world’s second oldest profession yet having a lot in common with the first really rings true here.