…it seems that as they usually do, those who support a cause either because it fits an illogical or pronouncedly unpopular agenda of theirs or because they are, at least to some extent, obtuse, present arguments that intentionally omit the primary arguments expressed by their opposition.

This is certainly the case in the kerfuffle involving the intention to build a mosque in uncomfortably close proximity to Ground Zero.

From what I’m given to understand, there was already a mosque there, albeit a small one attended by local Muslims. However, the project at hand is for a large Islamic center, which, speaking for myself, is offensive. Not because I would deny Muslims a place of worship, but because the World Trade Center, having been destroyed along with thousands of lives in the name of Islam, is, like it or not, a memorial in itself not only to those who were murdered in the name of “The Religion of Peace” but also to those police, firefighters and others who lost their lives attempting, bravely and selflessly, to save those of others.

Erecting an Islamic center just there would be the same thing as raising a victory banner for Osama bin Laden and every other militant Islamofasist on earth, commemorating their victory (yes, to those sick f##ks, mass murder is a form of victory) over America and believers in liberty everywhere. Ergo, a very hard slap in the face to those of us who mourn the victims of 11 September 2001.

But I digress, as usual.

Getting back to the beginning of this post: I read letters to editors and opinions at other forums, again and again, whose writers accuse us detractors of racism, of wanting to deny Muslims a place of worship in Manhattan. These people are either obtuse, as I wrote above, or they are intentionally ignoring the true reasons for our opposition.

To them, I say: “It’s not the fact of a mosque being built in Manhattan, boneheads, it’s purely the location of the intended mosque.

The developer and the Imam involved are both well aware of this as well, and by their insistence on building it there no matter what the majority of New Yorkers and, for that matter, Americans feel about this they make it quite plain that they are ramming it down our throats for exactly the reason I stated above: To shove 9/11 in our faces, to remind us constantly that Muslims did it to us, to plant a victory flag right at the site of their grisly, destructive handiwork.

If this weren’t their sole set of reasons, they would have accepted the state-owned land in another location, offered by Governor Paterson, or sought a different location on their own when they realized that there was so much heartfelt mass opposition to the place at hand.

Once the project, which is strongly endorsed by Bloomberg the Weasel and various other multiculturalist toilet cakes who care not a whit about the will of the American people, has been completed, it will serve as Islamo-terrorists’ raised middle finger to all of us freedom loving Americans for all time.

It’s pretty obvious that once the damn thing is built and in use, its very existence, because of its location, will do more to provoke hostility against Muslims than many acts of terrorism, but rest assured that dhimmi ass hats like Bloomberg will blame small minds, bigotry and anything else that comes to mind, rather than their own ilk for enabling the completion of the project against the wishes of the majority of the voting, tax-paying public that pays them.

…this kind of filthy, sleazy prophylacticism generally leads to instant dismissal, and with good cause.

Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer demanded Friday that a reference to the state’s controversial immigration law be removed from a State Department report to the United Nations’ human rights commissioner.

The U.S. included its legal challenge to the law on a list of ways the federal government is protecting human rights.

In a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Brewer says it is “downright offensive” that a state law would be included in the report, which was drafted as part of a UN review of human rights in all member nations every four years.

Governor Brewer is absolutely right, in fact…

“The idea of our own American government submitting the duly enacted laws of a state of the United States to ‘review’ by the United Nations is internationalism run amok and unconstitutional,” Brewer wrote.

And some actually deny that the leftists running our government are traitors!

This one came in a forward from a friend, and I simply couldn’t resist.

The train was quite crowded, so a U. S. Marine walked the entire length looking for a seat, but the only seat left was taken by a well dressed, middle-aged, French woman’s poodle.

The war-weary Marine asked, “Ma’am, may I have that seat?”

The French woman just sniffed and said to no one in particular, “Americans are so rude. My little Fifi is using that seat.”

The Marine walked the entire train again, but the only seat left was under that dog.

“Please, ma’am. May I sit down here? I’m very tired.”

She snorted, “Not only are you Americans rude, you are also arrogant!”

This time the Marine didn’t say a word; he just picked up the little dog, tossed it out the train window, and sat down.

The woman shrieked, “Someone must defend my honour! Put this American in his place!”

An English gentleman sitting nearby spoke up and said to the Marine, “Sir, you Americans seem to have a penchant for doing the wrong thing. You hold the fork in the wrong hand. You drive your cars on the wrong side of the road. And now, sir, you seem to have thrown the wrong bitch out the window.”

Hat Tip: Ric.

…at least if one were a member of the party on the left side of the aisle, would have to be “Ouch!”

“We the people” are the familiar opening words of the Constitution of the United States– the framework for a self-governing people, free from the arbitrary edicts of rulers. It was the blueprint for America, and the success of America made that blueprint something that other nations sought to follow.

At the time when it was written, however, the Constitution was a radical departure from the autocratic governments of the 18th century. Since it was something so new and different, the reasons for the Constitution’s provisions were spelled out in “The Federalist,” a book written by three of the writers of the Constitution, as a sort of instruction guide to a new product.

The Constitution was not only a challenge to the despotic governments of its time, it has been a continuing challenge– to this day– to all those who think that ordinary people should be ruled by their betters, whether an elite of blood, or of books or of whatever else gives people a puffed-up sense of importance.

While the kings of old have faded into the mists of history, the principle of the divine rights of kings to impose whatever they wish on the masses lives on today in the rampaging presumptions of those who consider themselves anointed to impose their notions on others.

The Constitution of the United States is the biggest single obstacle to the carrying out of such rampaging presumptions, so it is not surprising that those with such presumptions have led the way in denigrating, undermining and evading the Constitution.

As is always the case with Thomas Sowell, very well put.

To truncate a bit…

It is no coincidence that those who imagine themselves so much wiser and nobler than the rest of us should be in the forefront of those who seek to erode Constitutional restrictions on the arbitrary powers of government. How can our betters impose their superior wisdom and virtue on us, when the Constitution gets in the way at every turn, with all its provisions to safeguard a system based on a self-governing people?

To get their way, the elites must erode or dismantle the Constitution, bit by bit, in one way or another. What that means is that they must dismantle America. This has been going on piecemeal over the years but now we have an administration in Washington that circumvents the Constitution wholesale, with its laws passed so fast that the public cannot know what is in them, its appointment of “czars” wielding greater power than Cabinet members, without having to be exposed to pubic scrutiny by going through the confirmation process prescribed by the Constitution for Cabinet members.

Now there is leaked news of plans to change the immigration laws by administrative fiat, rather than Congressional legislation, presumably because Congress might be unduly influenced by those pesky voters– with their Constitutional rights– who have shown clearly that they do not want amnesty and open borders, despite however much our betters do. If the Obama administration gets away with this, and can add a few million illegals to the voting rolls in time for the 2012 elections, that can mean reelection, and with it a continuing and accelerating dismantling of America.

Infuriating, at least to those of us who love America and embrace both the wisdom and the freedom guaranteed us by the Constitution, but true.

Read the entire spot-on column.

…revisit Arnold Ahlert, didn’t I?

Well, here he is again, telling it like it is, no nonsense and no punches pulled.

This time, I feel compelled to post the entire column. Read it and…simmer.

“Barack Obama’s presidency is effectively over. Strong words? Ask yourself this: what other president of the United States would have spent almost three minutes speaking at the Dept. of Interior before getting around to mentioning the fact that twelve soldiers had been killed, and thirty one wounded in a massacre at Fort Hood in Texas?”

Alas, most Americans let this travesty slide down the memory hole. Thankfully, like he has with so many other unpopular positions, Barack Hussein Obama has “doubled down:” his support of the Ground Zero mosque is game, set, match.

As I wrote in my previous column, the true intentions of the mosque builders were revealed when they turned down NY Governor David Patterson’s offer of state land in return for re-locating the mosque away from Ground Zero. They refused. That this “factoid” was seemingly irrelevant to the president speaks volumes.

It is worth remembering this is the same president who belittled ordinary Americans for “clinging” to religion. I guess Muslims “clinging” to a location that infuriates the overwhelming majority of Americans is perfectly fine, even after it’s been revealed for the rankly provocative plan it truly is.

Ordinary Americans? They recognize a self-aggrandizing, holier-than-thou phony when they see one. They aren’t fooled by a president who says that, “Ground Zero is, indeed, hallowed ground”–only seconds before he reveals the total hollowness of that statement by saying he’s fine with a mosque on top of it.

Some one must have told Mr. Obama it wasn’t flying. On Saturday, he issued a “clarifying” statement: he wasn’t commenting on the “wisdom” of putting a mosque in a particular location, but on the “right people have that dates back to our founding.”

Baloney.

Reasonable Americans aren’t demanding anything remotely resembling a ban on Islam or the ability of its adherents to worship as they please. They’re saying show some respect for American sensibilities, and don’t build a mosque adjacent to the place where a national tragedy took place–one perpetrated in the name of Islam.
I have tremendous respect for the office of the presidency. That respect has gotten me and doubtless a lot of other Americans through some pretty tough times. And as much as I’ve disliked some of the people who’ve occupied that office, I’ve always taken comfort in the fact that, when push comes to shove, every one of those men, irrespective of political ideology, had America’s best interests at heart.

No longer. For the first time in my lifetime, we have an alien in the White House.

And that doesn’t mean what some of you might think. For the purposes of this column, the “birther debate” is irrelevant. What I’m talking about is a man completely divorced from the American ethos. A man who is utterly clueless about what most Americans want, think or feel. The first president of the United States on the public record with the idea that American exceptionalism is nothing more than one item on a laundry list of national exceptionalisms–none better or worse than any other.

A man who will take America’s side–only after he’s concluded that it doesn’t conflict with his larger worldview.

Sadly, we’ve reached a point where most Americans don’t expect anything different. And why should they? This is a man up to his neck in meaningful associations with card-carrying members of the Hate America crowd–from boyhood mentor, communist Frank Marshall, and racist preacher, Jeremiah Wright, to Weather Underground terrorists Bill Ayers and Bernadette Dohrn, and other rabid leftists. This is a man who has stacked his administration with a roster of radicals dedicated to the idea that America is a nation of unrepentant bigots, racists and other low-lifes who must be whipped into “progressive” shape. This is a man who learned–and taught–the “Alinsky Method,” a blueprint for the radical re-organization of America by stealth.

Why has the president doggedly kept entire parts of his life, from his early college years straight through law school, away from public view? Bet the farm it’s because any paper trail from those years would reveal this president to be the Marxist/socialist radical that occasionally breaches the “teleprompted” facade he has so carefully erected.

Last Friday, the mask slipped once again. It would have been the easiest thing in the world to point a comment directly towards the Cordoba House builders explaining that, while freedom of religion is a sacred American value, their refusal to accept an alternative site on state land offered by the governor is very troubling. He could have called their bluff and said he stands with the overwhelming majority of Americans who find such a refusal appalling. He could have said that “cultural sensitivity” is a two-way street, and that it is about time self-professed “moderate Muslims” demonstrated their moderation
.
But he didn’t. And he didn’t because, for this “citizen of the world,” the idea of “putting America first” requires considerable effort. Quite frankly, this is astounding. There is no other position in government where the idea of being “reflexively American” is more important. There is no other man in the country with the unfettered power to put American men and women in harm’s way. That fact alone requires unstinting loyalty to our nation, and an unbridled sense of patriotism.

Is that what Americans see when they look at Barack Obama? Or do they see a narcissistic, serial apologizer, a split-the-difference-with-our-enemies appeaser who golfs and parties–while America burns?

This president, along with his lap-dog media supporters, will continue to tell Americans that their anger and disgust has little or nothing to do with the shortcomings of Barack Obama. Everything wrong with the country is “someone else’s fault,” be it “racist” tea partiers, “fat cat” bankers, “greedy” doctors, “irresponsible” corporations, Republicans, or their favorite whipping boy, George W. Bush.

Sorry, Mr. Obama, no sale. You’ve done a grand job of alienating the majority of Americans all by yourself. And you know it too, or you wouldn’t have “clarified” your position on the Ground Zero mosque twenty four hours after the “real you” revealed itself.

Perhaps someday we’ll have someone in the Oval Office with a more jaundiced view of America than yours. I hope I never live to see it. And I fervently hope Americans remember exactly who you are when 2012 rolls around. We can probably muddle through two more years with a charlatan in the White House.

Heaven help America if it’s six.

As if that isn’t enough, let’s visit Always On Watch, and read about some blatantly offensive revisionist history ala B. Hussein Obama.

[Obama said:] “Islam has always been a part of America’s story.”

Indeed!

That would be the same Treaty of Tripoli that was essentially a protection racket against the United States, requiring that tribute be paid to avoid being the victim of piracy.

That would be the same John Adams who reluctantly figured that bribing the pirates of Barbary was cheaper than military engagement (out of an understanding that the political will and money for creating the necessary naval force was out of reach for the time being).

And that would be the same Thomas Jefferson who, with his great knowledge and understanding of the Koran, reversed our course and decided that military engagement against the various Muslim states engaged in piracy was the only sensible way to proceed.

And then bombarded their coastline, invaded them, and persuaded them to find a new hobby….

Heaven help America if this jamoke makes it through his FOUR without getting the boot!

…What have we here?

On November 8, 2006, Nancy Pelosi, on the precipice of becoming the third most important public official in our government, uttered the now infamous words that will prove to define her tenure as Speaker of the House:

“The American people voted to restore integrity and honesty in Washington, D.C., and the Democrats intend to lead the most honest, most open and most ethical Congress in history…”

When you read that today knowing what’s happened in the last three years, you might not know whether to laugh or feel appalled. You have your garden variety scandals at the hands of Eric Massa, Charlie Rangel & Maxine Waters, but what’s more, the complete disregard for the voters’ voices by the very people who promised to lead an honest and transparent Congress: Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi. Congressional Democrats’ actions have been devastating to our economy, healthcare, and most important, the civil discourse in the United States. You thought you couldn’t take anymore head-scratching, face-palming comments from the very people whose salaries you pay? You are sadly mistaken.

Read on.

Meanwhile, Rep. John Shadegg is once again trying to persuade his fellow representatives to do the right thing.

A Republican congressman says all bills introduced in Congress should include a statement setting forth the specific constitutional authority under which a law is being enacted.

Rep. John Shadegg (R-Ariz.) says his Enumerated Powers Act will force Congress to re-examine the role of the national government and curb its “ever-expanding reach.”

“For too long, the federal government has operated without Constitutional restraint, creating ineffective and costly programs and massive deficits year after year,” Shadegg writes on AmericaSpeakingOut, a Republican Web site that seeks ideas from the American people.

Shadegg says the trend of Congress overstepping its role has gotten “alarmingly worse” in the past 18 months.

As CNSNews.com has reported, some lawmakers apparently do not consider the Constitution in writing legislation.

In the debate over health care, for example, CNSNews.com asked various members of Congress — including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi — “Where does the Constitution authorize Congress to force individuals buy health insurance?”

Pelosi’s response — “Are you serious? Are you serious?” — was one of many nonplussed answers CNSNews.com received.

Indeed, who would expect today’s Democrats, especially under the perverse, corrupt and treasonous leadership of Komrade Pelosi, to even consider applying the appropriate Constitutional authority to any bill? If the party presently holding the majority in Congress were held to Constitutional requirements, all we’d hear from that side of the aisle would be crickets chirping.

The question is, when the GOP regains its majority or at least wins enough seats for more even voting power this November, will they be willing to adopt Shadegg’s proposal as a requisite to voting on all bills in Congress?

It was their lackluster performance that lost them the majority in the 2006 elections, so…

Time, as they say, will tell. Time, however, is something our beloved republic, as we know it, seems to have developed a paucity of.

Liberals always accuse conservatives of “playing politics” when we point out the unconstitutionality of so much of their legislation.

Does this mean that if John Q. Citizen breaks the law and a cop arrests him for it, he can accuse the cop of “playing politics”?

Same difference.

…please shut up.

From John Stossel, who begins thus:

I’m getting tired of Alan Greenspan. First, the former Federal Reserve chairman blamed an allegedly unregulated free market for the housing and financial debacle. Now he favors repealing the Bush-era tax cuts.

This has a certain sad irony. Recall that Greenspan once was an associate of Ayn Rand, the philosophical novelist who provided a moral defense of the free market, or as she put it, the separation of state and economy. Greenspan even contributed three essays to Rand’s book “Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal” — one for the gold standard, one against antitrust laws, and one against government consumer protection.

It was slightly bizarre when Greenspan accepted President Reagan’s appointment to run the Fed — maybe he thought that as long as the Fed exists, better someone like him run it rather than one who really believes government should centrally plan money and banking. Be that as it may, Greenspan went on to pursue an easy-money policy in the early 2000s that is widely credited, along with the government’s easy-mortgage policy, for the boom and bust that followed.

And later concludes:

…Brian Riedl of the Heritage Foundation says that since the cuts, “The rich are now shouldering even more of the income tax burden.” The deficit has grown not because we are undertaxed but because government overspends. “Tax revenues are above the historical average, even after the tax cuts,” Riedl writes.

Given the stagnant economy, this is the worst possible time for tax increases. (Is there ever a good time?) Taking money out of the economy will stifle investment and recovery, and it’s unlikely to raise substantial revenue, even if that were a good thing.

Finally, the stupidest thing said about tax cuts is the often-repeated claim that “they ought to be paid for.” How absurd! Tax cuts merely let people keep money they rightfully own. It’s government programs, not tax cuts, that must be paid for. The tax-hungry politicians’ demand that cuts be “paid for” implies the federal budget isn’t $3 trillion, but $15 trillion — the whole GDP — with anything mercifully left in our pockets being some form of government spending. How monstrous!

If cutting taxes leaves less money for government programs, the answer is simple: Ax the programs!

Read it all here.

There’s nothing this humble blogger can add to that!

…coming down to can be well summed up in this column by Arnold Ahlert.

I hope the people of California have learned their lesson. All this silly voting stuff is “so Twentieth Century” Voting? We don’t need no stinkin’ voting. All we need is the “enlightened wisdom” of the judiciary. A solid majority voting in favor of keeping marriage between a man and a woman–for the second time? For the second time since 2000, the judiciary has invalidated the will of the people.

Like their counterparts in Arizona, the people of California are discovering that law, the will of the electorate, or even the Constitution is nothing more than a temporary impediment–a speed-bump if you will–to the eventual imposition of the liberal worldview. The American left’s accomplices, hacks in black robes who have sold their collective souls to the idea that “social justice trumps all,” are apparently immune to the idea that majority of Americans hold them in utter contempt.

Unfortunately that contempt is completely irrelevant to those who consider themselves intellectually and morally superior to the unwashed masses of ordinary Americans. In California, the expressed wishes of seven million people at the ballot box were tossed aside to placate radical homosexuals. In Arizona, the surveyed wishes of seventy percent of that state’s people were ignored to placate illegal aliens and their enablers. Only the Supreme Court–also tainted by people for whom the Constitution is nothing more than a point of departure for “discovering” one’s personal biases–can thwart America’s headlong march towards liberal fascism.

Make no mistake: fascism is a perfectly acceptable form of governance for the American left. As long as they control the levers of power, tyranny–a form of government where the people’s wishes are completely subservient to the ruling class–is a fine thing. And nothing abets that tyranny more than an in-the-tank judiciary, without which liberalism would already be sitting on the ash heap of history.

Truncating here.

… the lesser of two evils is still less evil. The Senate is about to put another radical leftist on the Supreme Court, a women with a demonstrated contempt for the law as written. That she is replacing another liberal jurist is scant comfort. If president Obama, who lamented that “the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in society,” and that they “didn’t break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution” gets to put a third judge on the Supreme Court, America as we know it may be over.

We are literally one Supreme Court Justice away from the imposition of a liberal fascist state.
And there is only one genuine antidote: the capture of the Senate–which has the final say on nominees–by Republicans. An ultimate panacea? Not even close. Perhaps little more than tourniquet to stanch the bleeding. But America is indeed bleeding. It has been deeply wounded by leftist ideology, which can only prosper if Americans continue to allow the judicial branch to run roughshod over the will of the people. Will Republicans allow that to happen? It’s certainly possible. Will Democrats allow that to happen?

Absolutely, one hundred percent yes.

Those are the real stakes of the 2010 election. By 2012, it may no longer matter. Do I take comfort in imploring you to vote for a Republican party with a track record nearly as tattered as the Democrats? Nope. But it beats the hell out of tyranny. What has happened in California and Arizona is the tip of the iceberg. If liberals had a clue they’d also be concerned: judicially-imposed tyranny may be breaking your way at present, but nothing is forever.

Tyranny is an equal-opportunity oppressor.

Now, this is the first column I recall reading by Arnold Ahlert, but I guarantee it won’t be the last as long as he keeps writing. The man has defined the current state of affairs and their inescapable cost to the America most of us grew up in and the America we love.

I’ve posted in the past about my concerns about “progressive” elitists legislating from the bench, in effect spitting on the will of the American people and therefore on the Constitution itself, and about the support they receive from the traitors in journalists’ clothing who belong to today’s mainstream media — traitors not because they believe in socialism and other issues that are alien to the Constitution and to rule of the nation by the people, upon which the United States was founded, but because they employ spin and disinformation, violating the trust invested in them by the public, in order to lend their support to those who would see America fail.

An enemy within — sorry to sound melodramatic, but there’s simply no other way to put it with comparable accuracy — has been using our own system to lead us down the road to our eventual demise as the free country we have been for over 230 years.

We are, quite literally, running out of time and if we don’t deal with this by giving the House and Senate a complete overhaul this November and in November 2012, we probably may as well hang it up.

…this penchant so many liberal progressive (yeah, I have to go along with Chuck’s assessment, those critters on the far left are too fascistic to be called “liberal”, just visit any left controlled enclave like Santa Monica, California and you’ll see what I mean) politicians have for ethics violation problems is reaching the kind of profusion that very nearly qualifies their entire ilk for a trademark on graft and corruption.

While Charles Rangel is still in the middle of addressing his lengthy list of “improprieties”, along comes more of the same for Maxine Waters and, like Charlie, rather than ‘fess up and do the right thing, she’s putting up a fight.

This is probably because in the political atmosphere of the last several years, Democrats have had a great deal of success in eluding their just desserts and even staying in office no matter what their respective offenses happened to be, while any Republican caught in even the mildest or merely alleged impropriety has been treated like an arch fiend by both the mainstream media and the Democrats, and generally resigned on his own.

I know, any progressive will immediately list every Republican in history who’s ever done, or allegedly done anything ethically questionable, but face it, where blatantly corrupt practices are concerned, the ratio of Democrats to Republicans stacks up much, much higher on the left side of the aisle.

Maybe the Democrats get off the hook most of the time, or receive wrist slappings only, because unethical, immoral or downright sleazy behavior (dirty deeds done dirt cheap?) is expected of them, while those on the conservative side of the fence are expected to behave more honorably and so are judged more harshly when they emulate Democrats.

****

On another note, there’s apparently been a semi-stealthy increase in New York City’s tobacco taxes (with a pack of butts already over $13.00 before this one), courtesy of Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a weasel supreme.

This weasel, originally a Democrat, ran as a Republican back when because there was already a Democratic candidate, and as soon as he was elected did what any good modern Democrat does: He raised taxes, began enforcing fineable laws that had been forgotten decades before and adding still others, anything he could come up with in order to wrench every possible dime from New Yorkers, rich, poor and in between.

This weasel spends more money frivolously, and brazenly so, than any mayor in the history of New York, then goes to the taxpayer for more with the nonchalant attitude that the city’s suffering from a dearth of operating funds due to a force of nature of some kind.

This weasel bribed the corrupt city government into allowing him to run for a third term, claiming that NYC needed him to fix the financial problems for which he himself was responsible, now he’s making them worse.

Wow, poor New York: Obama on the federal level, the Weasel on the local level.

Oh, and the Weasel has been calling himself an Independent for some time now. Great, an independent weasel.

One whose actual political history, no surprise, goes back to the same party as Charles Rangel and Maxine Waters.