What is really at stake in November

(HT:  Hugh Hewitt)

I call it the Cooked Frog Syndrome (CFS).  It’s the tendency to overlook the nature of an entity’s conduct because the evidence that forms the big picture is so spread out over time that one fails to formulate an objective picture of what’s really going on.  Just as a frog thrown into hot water will immediately jump out, were all the data presented at once, the correct conclusion is much more readily achieved.  But by throwing the frog into cold water and then slowly turning up the heat, the frog remains unconscious of the impending danger of its toasty demise.  To the former end, Hugh Hewitt’s find which I’ve reproduced below tells a very sad tale of the assault on our Constitution under the current administration that liberals and the left don’t want you to realize.  Hopefully this list will open some eyes.  I’ve added bullet points to the list to make the examples clearer to read.  The final question I’ve bolded for emphasis.  Think about it.

~~~

The weekly column from Clark Judge:

The Constitutional Convention and The 2012 Election

by Clark S. Judge: managing director, White House Writers Group, Inc.; chairman, Pacific Research Institute

Today is Monday, May 14.  In 1787, also on Monday, May 14th, in Philadelphia, the Constitutional Convention held its opening session. 

Now, two hundred and twenty five years later, we are engaged in a great presidential campaign that, at its most essential level, is about the future of the governmental system the delegates to that convention wrought.  For in the last four years we have seen challenges to the long accepted meaning of many of the features and guarantees of the Philadelphia constitution.

In no particular order, here are examples:

• The manner of recent presidential appointments including to the National Labor Relations Board challenged widely shared understandings about the constitutionally mandated advice and consent role of the Senate.
• The expansive and aggressive use of regulation – for example, EPA’s moves to reclassify CO2 as a pollutant because of its supposed impact on climate after Congress had repeatedly rejected similar proposals – has challenged the line between legislative and executive powers.
• By overriding bondholders, this administration’s federal auto bailout arguably challenged long understood constitutional limits to taking property without due process and upset the constitutionally mandated uniform rules of bankruptcy.
• By requiring Catholic and other religiously affiliated institutions to provide health coverage that violated basic denominational beliefs, federal Obamacare challenged the widely understood standards of religious liberty.
• In this year’s state of the union address, the president suggested that during a second term he would compel states to accept his spending priorities as their own, anticipating a challenge to the constitutional concept of federalism, as long understood.
• As former White House counsel Boyden Gray has pointed out, the framing of the Dodd-Frank financial regulation bill that the administration championed so vigorously challenges fundamental constitutional rules regarding judicial review.
• As Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy suggested in the recent high court hearings on the administration’s signature health care legislation, the central feature of Obamacare challenges the long-established relationship between the government and the citizen, in other words, basic constitutional understandings of liberty.

Reading the record of the Philadelphia deliberations, you can’t help but be struck at how seriously the Framers took the purposes detailed in the Constitution’s preamble: “form a more perfect union… establish justice… insure domestic tranquility… provide for the common defense… promote the general welfare… secure the blessings of liberty.”   These terms come up repeatedly in their debates as failures of government under the Articles of Confederation and as the goals for their project.

Would they have said that the Fast and Furious program is an example of establishing justice?

Would they have agreed that radically downsizing the Navy provides for the common defense?

Is a reelection campaign designed to stoke animosity between economic and social groups consistent with insuring domestic tranquility?

Most of all, perhaps, when our senior military officer names the national debt our biggest national security challenge… when bond rating agencies downgrade the country’s credit standing… when major federal trust funds are careening toward bankruptcy… when general fund deficits and debt are projected permanently to top levels previously seen only in the single most expensive year of World War II, thanks to spending beyond levels we have ever seen, at least in peacetime… is utterly refusing to address any element of this spending crisis an example of providing for the common defense, promoting the general welfare or securing the blessings of liberty for ourselves and our posterity?

These are not just my questions.  In calls around the country over the last few weeks, I have repeatedly heard anxiety expressed about the future of America’s fundamental institutions: the open economy, the family, religious liberty, as well as the Constitution.

Yes, anemic economic growth and the lack of job creation are major worries, too.  Many ask, how could the administration have spent so much money for, we were told, stimulating the economy and got so little for it?

Granting all that, still I wonder, is it too much to say that this election is shaping up into a new Constitutional Convention, in which we the people will decide the character of our country for generations to come?

Ouch!

Random thoughts from a wise man:

How long do politicians have to keep on promising heaven and delivering hell before people catch on, and stop getting swept away by rhetoric?

Can anyone say…emotions?

With all the talk about people paying their "fair share" of income taxes, why do nearly half the people in this country pay no income taxes at all? Is that their "fair share"? Or is creating more recipients of government handouts, at no cost to themselves, simply a strategy to gain more votes?

Yah think?!?  (Oh, sorry, didn’t mean to intrude that “t” word!)

Some people are puzzled by the fact that so much that is said and done by politicians seems remote from reality. But reality is not what gets politicians elected. Appearances, rhetoric and emotions are what get them elected. Reality is what the voters and taxpayers are left to deal with, as a result of electing them.

Talk about reality checks!

Instead of following the tired old formula of having politicians and bureaucrats give college commencement speeches, in which they say how superior it is to follow a career as politicians and bureaucrats — "public service" — why not invite someone like John Stossel to tell the graduates how much better it is to go into the private sector, supplying what people want, instead of imposing the government’s will on them?

There’s some guidance counseling you’ll never hear!

In politics, few talents are as richly rewarded as the ability to convince parasites that they are victims. Welfare states on both sides of the Atlantic have discovered that largesse to losers does not reduce their hostility to society, but only increases it. Far from producing gratitude, generosity is seen as an admission of guilt, and the reparations as inadequate compensations for injustices — leading to worsening behavior by the recipients.

A cause and effect incomprehensible to the left.

Different people prefer different exercises. The Republicans’ favorite exercise is running for the hills. The Democrats’ favorite exercise is kicking the can down the road.

Diversity?

Go read the rest…now!

The Nationalization of the Family

A very interesting read from Mark Steyn here.  Some choice excerpts to induce a full reading:

Well, because, as Vaidyanathan says, we’ve nationalized the family — which means that these days a right isn’t a real right unless it comes from the state, and for "free." This is why the Mitch Daniels distinction between "fiscal" and "social" issues is so unhelpful. The nationalized family is the key to understanding why the West’s economic "downturn" is not merely cyclical. Like any other nationalized industry, the nationalized family prioritizes more and more perks for its beneficiaries, is unresponsive to market pressure, and revels in declining productivity. Literally: The biggest structural defect in the Western world is its deathbed demography, the upside-down family tree. When 100 grandparents have 42 grandchildren (as in Greece), it is a societal challenge under any circumstances. When 42 grandchildren have to pay off the massive debts run up by 100 grandparents, that’s pretty much a guarantee of disaster.

And his concluding remarks (emphasis added):

As Mitch Daniels might say, that’s the economy, stupid. But it’s really the stupidity, economists. Could Mr. Tata’s U.K. workers either rediscover the Protestant work ethic or adopt the Hindu one? I wouldn’t bet on it. From the Daily Telegraph a year or so back: "Physical inactivity should be classed as ‘disease in its own right’, a pair of leading public health experts have proposed."

Why stop there? We’re surely only a pair of public-health experts away from declaring that, if the Western world is crippled by debt, then debt must be a disability. And not merely of the sovereign variety. In Spain, private debt is 227 percent of GDP. The nationalized family doesn’t save. Why should it? The state pays for your retirement, and your kids, and your aged parents, and your health care. What’s to save for?

In the end, in Britain and much of Europe, the nationalized industries of the post-war years got privatized — which is how an Indian tycoon came to own the formerly state-run Jaguar and Land Rover. Privatizing the nationalized family will prove a tougher proposition.

The Bottom of the Abyss Beckons

Unless you’ve been living under a rock in Outer Mongolia somewhere, you have to at least be aware of the latest movie sensation sweeping the country and setting records everywhere, to wit, The Hunger Games.  Probably one of the clearest measures of the state of health of a culture is that with which it chooses to entertain itself.  The basis of this assertion is the observation that is best formulated in the form of a question:  if you wouldn’t do it yourself, why be entertained by it?

Sadly, this movie strongly suggests we are so close to the bottom of the abyss of depravity that the sudden stop at the end is imminent.

Why would I utter such a scathing criticism when everyone else, or so it would seem, is brimming over with praise?  The fact that someone would have to ask the question is a condemnation of the desensitization of our culture in general, and of the individuals in particular that comprise that culture.

The key question:  What is the core, the essence of the plot?  What is drawing such crowds?  Plain and simple, it is teens murdering teens.

You can gush over how they don’t emphasize the blood and gore all you want…it’s still teens murdering teens.

You can pontificate all you want over the alleged redeeming qualities, or the profound political statements, or the dystopian setting of the film, or the heroine’s undaunted courage in the face of such adversity…it’s still teens murdering teens.

And you want to be entertained by it?!?

Note:  lest you think I am being hypocritical, all my comments are based on the various and sundry commentaries and movie reviews and other such news stories that have bubbled to the surface on the web lately.  I have not seen the movie nor read the book(s), nor do I plan to do so.  There is more than sufficient material in these reviews to render viewing the film unnecessary to the formation of a judgment.  And I choose to make a statement in not being entertained by a movie that glorifies teens murdering teens.  If you have chosen otherwise, that is your prerogative, but I would seriously ask you to evaluate your reasons for doing so, the consequences of having done so, and what it says about you that this is how you choose to be entertained.  Consider, one honest youngster actually responded to a reporter’s question about what he thought about the movie with something like, “I think I’ll have nightmares.”  (Sorry, I forgot to save the link; I didn’t know I’d be writing this at the time.)

It should also cause some consternation that even secular authorities are voicing concern over whether or not the film is appropriate for the alleged target audience.  That is a discussion one rarely sees.

Now, I would further call your attention to the slippery slope into depravity that God describes for us in Romans chapter one and ask you to briefly consider, if you will, where we are in the progression described there relative to this issue and this movie.

Step one:  Suppressing the truth – 1:18-23

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them.  For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse, because, although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened.  Professing to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man–and birds and four-footed animals and creeping things.

Lest you object that you don’t worship idols, we still have gods made in the image of man and by man…just check your TV and news media.  Our current MSM does bow down to the One in more ways than one.  An idol does not have to be some statue to which you bow down.  It can be anything from the almighty dollar to Globaloney Warming to evolution.  Anything that replaces the Creator God from His rightful position of unique supremacy in your life.

The fruit of this first step?  Futile thoughts, foolish and dark hearts.  Self-profession of wisdom while totally missing the boat on even the most basic things of life.  Sound at all familiar?

Step two:  heterosexual immorality – 1:24-25

Therefore God also gave them up to uncleanness, in the lusts of their hearts, to dishonor their bodies among themselves, who exchanged the truth of God for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.

We saw this at the end of the 20^th century in an overabundance and still see it today.  It is the next fruit of self-worship in which self-gratification is the highest goal.

Step three:  homosexual immorality – 1:26-27

For this reason God gave them up to vile passions. For even their women exchanged the natural use for what is against nature.  Likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust for one another, men with men committing what is shameful, and receiving in themselves the penalty of their error which was due.

No, it is not the most wicked of sins, but it is still sin.  And don’t blather about love and how all love is OK and isn’t God all about love and aren’t we supposed to love one another.  Those who do so simply show an ignorance of magnanimous proportions regarding the topic and the Bible.  How do I know?  One verse points out the flaw in their logic (if logic it be):  1 Corinthians 13:6:

[Love] does not rejoice in iniquity [lit., lawlessness], but rejoices in the truth;

The militantly aggressive agenda of the homosexual activists goes well beyond a simple protection from persecution to a forcing of their worldview upon all.  And please don’t hyperventilate and obfuscate into the tactic of trying to call this hate speech.  Disagreement is not hate, pure and simple, and no, you cannot redefine the language to suit yourself.

More could be said here, and maybe I will sometime later.

Step four:  a debased mind that issues forth in a depravity that permeates all aspects of life – 1:28-32

And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind, to do those things which are not fitting; being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil-mindedness; they are whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, violent, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, unforgiving, unmerciful; who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death, not only do the same but also approve of those who practice them.

This is the bottom of the barrel.  I invite you to hold up the newspaper (or the computer screen as the case is more often these days) to this list.  Look at it carefully.  And more relevant to this post, hold this list up to the movie we are talking about here.  (Hint:  check out the words highlighted in red.)

Notice how these verses close.  Not only is pleasure taken in the practice of such depraved behavior, but these individuals encourage one another in their depravity, patting each other on the back for their liberality of life.  They are in for a rude awakening when they do finally meet their Maker!

What is God’s judgment for such people?  Aside from what we can glean in the above, we have, for example, Isaiah 5:20:

Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who put darkness for light, and light for darkness; Who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!

Our entire cultural milieu has become toxic for biblical godliness by attempting all too successfully to adopt this Doublethink and Newspeak.  The evidence is before your eyes in just about every day’s news.

For those who are Christians, who mourn over the sin of our country (and I’m talking about much more than our current administration at the Federal level), we would do well to remember a principle of life that God repeatedly puts forth implicitly and explicitly from Genesis through Revelation.  It is a principle liberals hate, but their hate is impotent (see Psalm 2, especially verse 4).  It won’t stop this because neither God nor reality really care about what they feel.  You will find one of the more explicit statements of this principle in Galations 6:7, where we read:

Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap.

Yes, the abyss beckons…in more ways than one.  Are you prepared?

Steyn nails Romney

By jove, I couldn’t have said it better!  (Not that I could ever approach the level of the inimitable Mark Steyn!)  Regarding Romney’s statement on the poor:

Romney’s is a benevolent patrician’s view of society: The poor are incorrigible, but let’s add a couple more groats to their food stamps and housing vouchers, and they’ll stay quiet. Aside from the fact that that kind of thinking has led the western world to near terminal insolvency, for a candidate whose platitudinous balderdash of a stump speech purports to believe in the most Americanly American America that any American has ever Americanized over, it’s as dismal a vision of permanent trans-generational poverty as any Marxist community organizer with a cozy sinecure on the Acorn board would come up with.

After half-a-century of evidence, what sort of “conservative” offers the poor the Even Greater Society? I don’t know how “electable” Mitt is, but, even if he is, the greater danger, given the emptiness of his campaign to date, is that he’ll be elected with no real mandate for the course correction the Brokest Nation in History urgently needs. In last Monday’s debate, Newt said he wasn’t interested in going to Washington to “manage the decline”. Mitt’s just told us that he’s happy to “manage the decline” for the poor – but who knows who else?

A point to ponder

When the politicians complain that TV turns the proceedings into a circus, it should be made clear that the circus was already there, and that TV has merely demonstrated that not all the performers are well trained.

Edward R. Murrow
US broadcast journalist & newscaster (1908 – 1965)

Dr. Sowell and Occupy Wall Street

There is a short essay currently being posted on various blogs that appears to be incorrectly attributed to Dr. Thomas Sowell.  The confusion probably arises from the fact that the original author closed with a quotation by Dr. Sowell, and thus the whole essay has been attributed to him.

Regardless, this unknown author has made a brilliant assessment of our nation at this hour in history:

The current Occupy Wall Street movement is the best illustration to date of what President Barack Obama’s America looks like. It is an America where the lawless, unaccomplished, ignorant and incompetent rule. It is an America where those who have sacrificed nothing pillage and destroy the lives of those who have sacrificed greatly.

It is an America where history is rewritten to honor dictators, murderers and thieves. It is an America where violence, racism, hatred, class warfare and murder are all promoted as acceptable means of overturning the American civil society.

It is an America where humans have been degraded to the level of animals: defecating in public, having sex in public, devoid of basic hygiene. It is an America where the basic tenets of a civil society, including faith, family, a free press and individual rights, have been rejected. It is an America where our founding documents have been shredded and, with them, every person’s guaranteed liberties.

It is an America where, ultimately, great suffering will come to the American people, but the rulers like Obama, Michelle Obama, Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, Joe Biden, Jesse Jackson, Louis Farrakhan, liberal college professors, union bosses and other loyal liberal/Communist Party members will live in opulent splendor.

It is the America that Obama and the Democratic Party have created with the willing assistance of the American media, Hollywood , unions, universities, the Communist Party of America, the Black Panthers and numerous anti-American foreign entities.

Barack Obama has brought more destruction upon this country in four years than any other event in the history of our nation, but it is just the beginning of what he and his comrades are capable of.

The Occupy Wall Street movement is just another step in their plan for the annihilation of America.

“Socialism, in general, has a record of failure so blatant that only an intellectual could ignore or evade it.” – Thomas Sowell

This is not to say that Dr. Sowell has been silent on the OWS phenomenon.  Quite to the contrary, his analysis has been just as cutting in its clarity and accuracy.

Democracy Versus Mob Rule

By Thomas Sowell, October 31, 2011

In various cities across the country, mobs of mostly young, mostly incoherent, often noisy and sometimes violent demonstrators are making themselves a major nuisance.

Meanwhile, many in the media are practically gushing over these “protesters,” and giving them the free publicity they crave for themselves and their cause — whatever that is, beyond venting their emotions on television.

Members of the mobs apparently believe that other people, who are working while they are out trashing the streets, should be forced to subsidize their college education — and apparently the President of the United States thinks so too.

But if these loud mouths’ inability to put together a coherent line of thought is any indication of their education, the taxpayers should demand their money back for having that money wasted on them for years in the public schools.

Sloppy words and sloppy thinking often go together, both in the mobs and in the media that are covering them. It is common, for example, to hear in the media how some “protesters” were arrested. But anyone who reads this column regularly knows that I protest against all sorts of things — and don’t get arrested.

The difference is that I don’t block traffic, join mobs sleeping overnight in parks or urinate in the street. If the media cannot distinguish between protesting and disturbing the peace, then their education may also have wasted a lot of taxpayers’ money.

Among the favorite sloppy words used by the shrill mobs in the streets is “Wall Street greed.” But even if you think people in Wall Street, or anywhere else, are making more money than they deserve, “greed” is no explanation whatever.

“Greed” says how much you want. But you can become the greediest person on earth and that will not increase your pay in the slightest. It is what other people pay you that increases your income.

If the government has been sending too much of the taxpayers’ money to people in Wall Street — or anywhere else — then the irresponsibility or corruption of politicians is the problem.

 

“Occupy Wall Street” hooligans should be occupying Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington. Maybe some of the bankers or financiers should have turned down the millions and billions that politicians were offering them. But sainthood is no more common in Wall Street than on Pennsylvania Avenue — or in the media or academia, for that matter.

Actually, some banks did try to refuse the government bailout money, to avoid the interference with their business that they knew would come with it. But the feds insisted — and federal regulators’ power to create big financial problems for banks made it hard to say no. The feds made them an offer they couldn’t refuse.

People who cannot distinguish between democracy and mob rule may fall for the idea that the hooligans in the street represent the 99 percent who are protesting about the “greed” of the one percent. But these hooligans are less than one percent and they are grossly violating the rights of vastly larger numbers of people who have to put up with their trashing of the streets by day and their noise that keeps working people awake at night.

As for the “top one percent” in income that attract so much attention, angst and denunciation, there is always going to be a top one percent, unless everybody has the same income. That top one percent has no more monopoly on sainthood or villainy than people in any other bracket.

Moreover, that top one percent does not consist of the “millionaires and billionaires” that Barack Obama talks about. You don’t even have to make half a million dollars to be in the top one percent.

Moreover, this is not an enduring class of people. Nor are people in other income brackets. Most of the people in the top one percent at any given time are there for only one year. Anyone who sells an average home in San Francisco can get into the top one percent in income — for that year. Other one-time spikes in income account for most of the people in that top one percent.

But such plain facts carry little weight amid the heady rhetoric and mindless emotions of the mob and the media.

---

Article printed from FrontPage Magazine: http://frontpagemag.com

URL to article: http://frontpagemag.com/2011/10/31/democracy-versus-mob-rule/

In addition, Dr. Sowell has been interviewed recently, in which he also talks about Occupy Wall Street.

Thomas Sowell Interview Part 1: Occupy Wall Street: Thomas Sowell has just released “The Thomas Sowell Reader,” a collection of writings from the seemingly endless books and columns he has written over the years. Sowell recently took time to do an interview with IBD about the “Reader” and current events.

Thomas Sowell Part 2: Occupy Higher Education: They’ve gotten their money’s worth because it is mostly other people’s money that has paid for their education. But do I think that taxpayers have gotten their money’s worth? By no means. Taxpayers are paying something like $10,000 per student per year and you end up with people who are absolutely incoherent. It’s unbelievable. Every interview I’ve seen of these protesters, they can’t string together three sentences that make any coherent sense.

Thomas Sowell Part 3: Income Inequality And Economic Myths: The other thing is that most people who are in the top 1% in income are there only one year. Over a period of about a decade the IRS tracked these people by Social Security numbers. Something like two-thirds of the people who were in the top 1% during that decade were in there one time. Only 13% were in there two years. Pundits talk about these income brackets as if they are enduring classes of people when they are simply transient snapshots of people who happen to be there right now.

It will be well worth your time to digest thoroughly the words of wisdom from this noted conservative, who, by the way, happens to have a Ph.D. in economics and thus might have an inkling whereof he speaks.

Populist Socialism on the Rise – Mark Alexander

Mark Alexander’s essay from the Patriot Post today says so much that I wanted to say that I will just reproduce it here below.  Enjoy!

~~~

Populist Socialism on the Rise

The "99 Percent" are really the "35 Percent" but their cadres are growing

"The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence. If ‘Thou shalt not covet’ and ‘Thou shalt not steal’ were not commandments of Heaven, they must be made inviolable precepts in every society before it can be civilized or made free." –John Adams, 1787

The populist message of the Occupy Movement, the agelessly adolescent class warriors who make up Barack Hussein Obama’s Red October Uprising, now has the support of some 35 percent of Americans, mostly urbanites.

The Occupiers have now infested cities from coast to coast, including Oakland,Seattle, Denver, Austin, Chicago,Atlanta, Baltimore, New York and Boston.

Their mantra is simple (by necessity): "We are the 99 Percent, and we’re all victims of the 1 Percent." By any objective standard, the 99 Percenters are not the brightest bunch, and they really represent the roughly 20 percent of Americans who are irrevocably dependent upon government subsidies and pay no income tax. Thus, this 20 percent has no vested interest in the cost of government and is predisposed to vote for the redistribution of others’ incomes rather than work for their own. The underlying assumption is that it’s easier to confiscate wealth than create it.

This "entitled" 20 percent combines with the 10 percent of American labor who are collectivists and another 5 percent who are perpetual malcontents to thus form Barack Hussein Obama’s entrenched socialist constituency of Useful Idiots.

The intellectually challenged Occupy morons have built their movement around the errant assertion that if the assets of the 1 Percent were entirely redistributed, everyone would live happily ever after. Unfortunately, what the 35 Percenters really want, "redistributive justice" as Obama calls it, would require the redistribution of income from the other 65 percent of Americans families who live on earned income, so that everyone could be equally impoverished.

Of course, there’s a problem with liquidating the assets of the 1 percent (comprised of more celebs and pro athletes than Wall Street bankers), or even the top 25 percent of the so-called rich: Most of their assets are on paper, and the rest of that "wealth" is in the form of small businesses and real property that support the jobs of tens of millions of Americans who actually work for a living — and take pride in their occupations.

Thus, liquidation would result in the collapse of the entire economy, leaving everyone under the same statist tyranny as Obama’s 35 Percenters — equally miserable, equally dependent upon the government, and that much closer to Obama’s mandate to implement Democratic Socialism.

Fact is, socialist economies always fail. In the inimitable words of former UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, "Socialist governments … always run out of other people’s money. They then start to nationalize everything."

Of course, socialists never let reality intrude upon their classist fantasies of universal equality and happiness. Nineteenth-century historian Alexis de Tocqueville once observed, "Democracy and socialism have nothing in common but one word: equality. But notice the difference: while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude."

If you have any doubt about the socialist motives of the Occupy Movement, consider this proclamation from my daily American Communist Party communiqué (yes, I subscribe to certain leftist publications, so, yes, I know my enemy): "We Are the 99%! The AFL-CIO has taken another step to embrace the Occupy Movement by creating their own We Are the 99% website. Also, CPUSA Chair Sam Webb has an article on the movement at the People’s World: ‘Occupy: embrace the new, build the movement.’"

Next, I suggest you review the official list of Occupy supporters, including Marxists, Nationalists, Fascists and even Islamists. What a sorry lot for a supporting cast.

Given all this, it’s not surprising that the Occupiers’ highest-profile support emanates from Obama himself, who says, "People are frustrated and the [Occupy] protesters are giving voice to a more broad-based frustration about how our financial system works. … I think it expresses the frustrations that the American people feel. … The American people understand that not everybody’s been following the rules. These days, a lot of folks doing the right thing are not rewarded. A lot of folks who are not doing the right thing are rewarded."

As to the Occupy Movement’s momentum, Obama says their agenda "will express itself until 2012 and beyond until people feel they are getting back to old-fashioned American values. That’s going to express itself politically in 2012 and beyond."

By "old-fashioned" we suspect he’s merely re-warming some propaganda from one of the most notable of 20th-century socialists, that inheritance welfare liberal Franklin Delano Roosevelt. It was FDR, after all, who channeled Karl Marx when he proclaimed, "Here is my principle: Taxes shall be levied according to ability to pay. That is the only American principle."

Roosevelt issued a collectivist "bill of rights" in which he said that the government should ensure "the right to a useful and remunerative job … the right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation … the right of every family to a decent home … the right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health … the right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age … the right to a good education."

For his part, Obama has been clear in his collectivist rhetoric: "[T]he wealthiest Americans have made out like bandits. … It’s not that I want to punish your success. I just want to make sure that everybody who is behind you, that they’ve got a chance for success too. I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody."

Our nation is at a critical juncture, and the adversaries of Liberty are well funded. However, a great national debate about the proper role of government is underway, and your support is critical to keep that momentum moving in the right direction.

The Patriot Post, since its inception, has been plowing the fields and sowing the seed for this Great Awakening. Our goal is to ensure that the movement remains, first and foremost, about the restoration of constitutional integrity, and to support its momentum.

There is still much to be done, however, and the defeat of Barack Obama and his socialist hordes next November is not preordained.

If we are to restore the cause of Liberty, we need your help. We can restore the integrity of our Constitution only by growing the ranks of conservative voices. We cannot undo generations of civic negligence in one or two election cycles, but we can — no, we must — halt our nation’s downward spiral toward the tyranny of Democratic Socialism.

Proud?!?

Oh!

Pretending

Recognition

Overcomes

Utter

Disaster?

Cracks in the Foundation…Bats in the Belfry

(HT:  Patriot Post)  Arnold Ahlert nails it concisely (emphases added):

The trouble with the OWS movement is that it’s centered around two concepts, both of which are abject lies. First and foremost, it doesn’t represent ninety-nine percent of anything, no mater how many time the protesters themselves, their enablers, or a corrupt mainstream media repeats the slogan. Second, there is nothing inherently virtuous about being poor or middle class, any more than there is anything inherently evil about being wealthy. Anyone who tells you otherwise is a liar or a fool. Percentage-wise, there are just as many low-lifes on Main Street as there are on Wall Street, and if people don’t like the direction in which this country is moving, they might want to consider the fact that the "everything is a shade of gray" moral relativism that afflicts this nation is the ultimate scourge. And make no mistake: it is a virus that infects every ethnic group, both genders and, as you may have guessed, every income class.

Until some kind of national integrity is restored, everything else comes down to dealing with the symptoms of the problem instead of the problem itself. How do you restore integrity? One self-aware person at a time coming to the realization that without it, you’re nothing but the member of a mob, whether that mob resides in Zuccotti Park, a bank boardroom, or the Beltway in Washington, D.C.

You want to camp out all winter and rail against the inequities of the world? Knock yourself out. I’m hoping a writer’s job or two opens up as a result.

Meanwhile, on the home front…