I have been reading about the treatment of Carrie Prejean by the media and her sponsors from the Miss California contest. They are not trying to show that her ideas are wrong. They are trying to destroy her reputation forever. This is getting out of hand. She said nothing offensive to anyone. Anyone who took offense from what she said needs to get a life.

The first step in destroying Carrie Prejean was Perez Hilton creating a video and calling her lots of names and saying her answer was the worst in pageant history. Perez wanted controversy. The only way Carrie could have answered that question to Perez Hilton’s satisfaction was if she wholeheartedly endorsed gay marriage and completely rejected straight marriage. That was never going to happen, given Carrie’s background. So, she was set up for this one.

The second step was for her Miss California leaders to say that her answer was her own and not the answer of the Miss California Pageant. They made a big point to insure that she was on her own. Her answer was almost exactly the same as Barack Obama made during the campaign for the Presidency. Her answer was entirely within the main stream of American thought. Her answer was entirely within the main stream of California thought. They voted in November and 53% supported Carrie’s position. I am not sure what the organizers expected her to say, but what she said was what more than half of any group of Americans would have said, anywhere.

After the first salvo did not work, they resorted to releasing some photos of Carrie when she was a teenager. She does not have a top on, but she has her arm over her breasts and they are turned away from the camera. As I heard one commentator say, she probably showed more skin in the swimsuit competition than in the photo. The people out to destroy Carrie are calling the photos topless and nude. Some of them even say they are pornographic. There is nothing to see in the photos that you cannot see on any beach or swimming pool deck in America.

Now, they say that she may have broken some Pageant rules and may be stripped of the Miss California crown. They are just looking for something to hang their hat on. They knew of these photos before the contest, because they released them shortly thereafter. The Miss California Pageant organizers will find some reason to strip her of the crown. The reason is that they want to strip her of the crown to show her and anyone like her that you cannot win a beauty pageant without toeing the gay agenda party line. If you so much as think thoughts that do not conform to the gay agenda, you have no chance to win a beauty pageant in the United States today. This is chilling stuff.

Have we sunk so far that we cannot speak freely any longer? What has happened to free speech? Is free speech now defined as only speech you agree with and all other speech is banned? That seems to be the rule for the people pushing the gay agenda. According to them, if you want the right of free speech, you have to conform to their position. Then, you can say anything you want as long as it conforms. If it strays from the gay agenda, then your right to free speech ends.

We are seeing some of that coming from the government in the push to regulate talk radio. First, they were talking about putting the Fairness Doctrine back in place. After talk radio worked on that one for a while, the idea of putting the Fairness Doctrine back in place is gone. But, the idea of regulating talk radio is not gone. The left is just trying to figure out a different way of doing it. There are a lot of options. They could make the radio license be renewed more often. That would give them a chance to work on the owners. This idea is not real good, unless mixed with another idea. They could make local review boards to decide if a radio station is putting on enough local issues. This would do it, especially if mixed with a more frequent license renewal. It would be difficult to sneak this one by the talk radio personalities without some reaction from them and their fans.

If the left succeeds in regulating talk radio and the internet, then they will insure that only left leaning candidates will be elected. Conservatives need not apply for office in that America. We would have succeeded in becoming a Fascist State. Whether we were a Fascist Republic or a Fascist Dictatorship would not matter very much as the Fascist part is the dominant part. The earmarks are there that says we are on the path to become a Fascist State. The left tolerates no speech except for their own is the biggest sign. The left is in control in Washington at a level I have never seen in my lifetime. They could push through the laws that make us a Fascist State, if they so choose. There wouldn’t be anyone to stop them. The problem would be if the military would support them in this effort. If the military said they would not support a Fascist America, then the entire house of cards, built by the Democrats, would crumble.

We are on a fast moving train that is taking us to socialism. Socialism is an idea that is easy to sell to the public. You can paint pretty pictures of the utopia that will exist if you give up all your freedom for the security of the socialist ideal. Many people buy into this utopian idea. They believe that the entire world will be fine if we just give up this freedom or that freedom or all of our freedoms. Our enemies will love us and everyone will live in peace and harmony.

That is a complete and total lie. No socialist country in the world has ever or will ever be in that state. The real world always impacts the socialist ideal. People are selfish and want to feed their families. People want the best for their children and grandchildren. The socialist model makes everyone the same. People do not want to be the same. They want to be treated equal. There is a huge difference between the two.

Socialism stifles everything that makes people human. People strive to make themselves the best they can be. People strive to build great things. People want to invent things. People want to enjoy the good things in life. People do not want everything to be the same. People want to be treated equally and get confused between the same and equal.

America has always believed that we are born equal. When we are born, we all have an equal chance to be anything we choose to be. As we make choices through childhood and adulthood, some windows open and some windows close. When we look back at life, we see what happened. As we go through life, we are not always aware of the choices being offered. But, we are not all given the same opportunity to succeed. Some of us are smarter than others. Some can run faster than others. Some are more musical than others. We all have gifts that allow us to succeed in some area and not others. That is equality because we can choose what we want to be. The same means that you would have to have the same chance to play professional baseball and win the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. That is not the case at all for any of us.

If you can get someone to understand what socialism will do to him or her, you can get them to reject socialist ideas. The trick is to get people to understand exactly what socialism will do to them individually. Most people think that socialized medicine will just take paying for a doctor from the insurance company to the government with no other changes. They do not realize that when the government takes over, rationing will take place and people will die before getting treatment that is readily available now. The same principles hold for any socialist idea. Get the government involved with it and you will have rationing. The government will only distribute a finite amount of anything. Capitalism will deliver an almost infinite amount of things if it can be profitable. Also, the quality of a government delivered product or service will be lower than a capitalist delivered product or service. The reason is that the government knows that it will be there to provide that product or service regardless of what you think. The private business that provides that product or service knows that it will only be there if it provides the best experience possible for the lowest price.

To tie this all up in a knot, socialism is the goal of the Obama administration. They want socialism of every part of the American way of life. If that takes place, it will strangle the life out of America. We will become a third world country or a follower of another. Things would be very bleak for my children and grandchildren. Progress for individuals that used to be available so that they could move from poverty to wealth in one generation will be gone. Older Americans will die off at a very high rate compared to now. Our health care would deteriorate so that people would start using home remedies instead of going to the doctor. That is the way it is in England and Canada right now.

The American people voted for change, but not a wholesale change from the best system in the world to the worst. The problem is that once you establish the worst system into your country it is almost impossible to eradicate. That is the problem the Canadians and English are having right now. If we can, we need to derail as much as possible until after the 2010 elections.

Democrats are focused on giving us socialized medicine, whether we want it or not. Based on an article I saw written by Hugh Hewitt, the Democrats have a speeded up timetable to deliver socialized medicine by the end of the year. They will meet in conferences in the House and Senate in June. Vote on the bill in July and August. Since the two bills will not be the same, they never are, they will meet in conference in October or November and vote on the finished bill in December. That would put the bill on the President’s desk before January one.

Exactly what they have planned at this time is not completely clear. You can be sure that it is a form of single-payer health care. That is the type they have in England and Canada. This is ignoring the fact that in England and in Canada, patients have to wait for long periods of time to get regular health care. If you have some life threatening illness, the wait time will probably be longer than your life expectancy. That is deliberate because the system is trying to save money. The easiest way for them to save money on health care is to not give it to you when you absolutely need it.

The most expensive time of a person’s health care life is the last six months. That is because the person is in the process of death. The person and the family are trying hard to save the life. So, everything possible is tried to try and save the person’s life. If the government gets in charge of health care, you can be sure that this type of measure will be the first casualty of the budget knife. That would save a lot of money they could then use on other health care measures.

Another problem is whether to give transplants and other expensive operations to people that are elderly at the time. These expensive operations would give that person a new life, but for how long? If you cut out these operations, you could save a lot of money to be used elsewhere. The people would die soon anyway, so who cares if they die a year or so early. That just means less population to take care of.

Handicapped people require a lot of medical attention. If you ration their health care, you could save a lot of money. I could go on, but I think that you get the point. The sick, elderly and handicapped will be the ones to feel the budget crunch first. For the first couple of years, we will probably not notice that much of a difference, if they do it right. But, over time, the system will fail just like it has in England and Canada.

The biggest problem in England and Canada is that they do not have enough doctors. Doctors are now government employees. As government employees, they unionize like all government employees are doing. They strike for higher wages and better conditions. Fewer people go into the medical field because they can make more money elsewhere. The doctors that we do get out of medical school are not as good as the doctors we turn out today. The reason is they are not as motivated to be doctors and they see it as a job, not a calling. That problem is already turning up with younger doctors. Older doctors see the medical profession as a calling and are willing to put in long hours. Younger doctors want a life as well as medicine. There is nothing wrong with that, but it means you need more doctors than we have today to serve the same number of people. We will be producing fewer doctors, not more.

I will probably not live long enough to see the system collapse like it is in England and Canada. It will take 30-40 years before the system cannot provide even basic services to the public. Canada regularly sends patients they cannot serve to the US for medical attention.

When I was in Spokane, Washington, there was an article in the local paper about women being sent to the US from Canada. The reason they were sent to the US was because Canadian hospitals had reached their quota of babies for the year. To serve the excess, they had to use US hospitals. The Canadian health service would not provide funds to allow these babies to be born in Canada like they should have. Where will the Canadians go when we have a system every bit as bad as theirs?

Socialized medicine can be stopped before it sees the light of day. Unfortunately, the Republicans are afraid to stand up to anything labeled health care reform. The AARP and other groups that should be interested in this reform are sitting on their hands. They either are hoping the Democrats are not serious or are waiting to see what the Democrats are coming up with. It does not matter what they come up with. If it is a single-payer system it will ration health care. If it rations health care, those who need health care the most will feel the brunt of the rationing.

Our current system is the best in the world. It has problems. Those problems can be addressed without throwing the baby out with the bath water. You do not have to destroy the best medical system in the world to correct some relatively minor problems. This is just madness that anyone could be serious about changing the system. But, Democrats want to control your lives. One of the best ways to control your lives is to control your health care. That is why they are changing the system from the best to the worst. They want to control the American public. You can be sure that the Congress and President will not have the same medical system as the rest of the American people. Democrats will see to that. They would never settle for second class medicine, like they are going to force down our throats.

During the election season, Barack Obama was built up as a Constitutional Scholar. He was supposed to have taught Constitutional Law at the University of Chicago. So, he should know the Constitution very well. He should be able to look at something and tell if it is Constitutional or not. That is why what has happened since January 20 has baffled me. I am no Constitutional scholar, but I do have a copy hanging up in my classroom. I read it before class.

For someone who is supposed to know the Constitution, he sure seems to be abusing his authority. He routinely oversteps his Constitutional authority and nobody questions his actions. That is also a problem. Even Congress, who took an oath to preserve and protect the Constitution, has routinely and deliberately gone outside their Constitutional authority since January. We seem to be living in a time where the Constitution does not matter any more. The Constitution only seems to matter when it is convenient, not at any other time.

How has Congress overstepped their Constitutional authority? Congress has no authority, as I read the Constitution, to give money to private companies. In fact, James Madison, who wrote the Constitution, made comments to that effect when the Constitution was being adopted. Yet, this Congress and the last Congress have given money to a host of companies. They have even acquired stock in these companies. That would make the US an owner of those businesses. The United States should not own businesses or any part of businesses. We operate under capitalism, not socialism. At least, that is the system that the Founders put into the Constitution. It worked well for over 230 years and we became the most powerful and prosperous country in the world. We do not want to emulate the poor socialist countries and always remain among the poorest countries in the world.

How has Barack Obama overstepped his Constitutional authority? He has gotten involved with hiring and firing CEO’s of companies. He has no authority to hire or fire any CEO of any company. The United States should have no ownership stake in any business, so the President should have no authority to hire or fire any of the staff. He is also trying to tell those companies how much they can pay their employees. Again, that is no business of the United States government, until tax time. If a company wants to pay someone $10,000 to do a job, that is ok. If they would rather pay that person $1,000,000 to do that job, that is ok.

The latest occasion of going outside his Constitutional authority is in the Chrysler situation. First, he tells Chrysler that they have to merge with Fiat, an Italian company. The President has no authority to tell Chrysler to do anything. Second, Chrysler felt it had to go through bankruptcy to make the merger take place. Barack Obama stuck his nose into the proceedings and decided who would win and who would lose. He decided that those that held an unsecured place should be first in line and those with secured loans should be last. That is exactly backwards from the way it is supposed to go. Secured debt is supposed to be cleared first and unsecured last. That would have meant that the UAW would have lost a lot of money. Since the UAW is a big Democrat contributor in money and campaign workers, Barack Obama felt they deserved a better place at the table. Obama gave the UAW a majority stock position in Chrysler ahead of the secured debt holders. Of course, the secured debt holders started to scream. When they started to make noise, Obama started calling them names and declaring them enemies of the state. The debt holders that had taken money from the government instantly collapsed and agreed to the decision of the President. Those that had not taken government money went to court and tried to argue their case. The judge decided that their names should be made public. The debt holders had wanted to remain anonymous because they were afraid that Barack Obama would try to demonize them as well. The secured debt holders are starting to cave because of the President’s bully pulpit and his ability to turn public opinion against them.

All of that is against the fifth amendment of the Constitution. That is depriving the secured debt holders of property without due process. The Constitution and the laws that come from it are inviolate. If they need to be changed, there are processes in place for them to be changed. They cannot be changed on the whim of the President or any other individual.

What astonishes me in this whole mess is the fact that NOBBODY in the media or the Republican Party is saying anything. Everybody is just letting Barack Obama get away with trashing the Constitution. Somebody with bigger soapbox needs to start calling Barack Obama what he is, a lawbreaker and a criminal. It is like the little boy who said the King has no clothes. Somebody had to say it before it became clear to everyone. SOMEBODY say something!!!

The Republican Party is in shambles right now. There are people on the right that say, throw out all the moderates and stick to core conservative principles. There are moderates that say, throw out the core conservative principles and move more to the left. Which will be the final winner? Only time will tell for sure. My gut instincts are to stick to conservative principles, because when they are spoken with conviction they always win.

Mitt Romney and Jeb Bush are on a “Listening Tour” around the country. Is there anyone in the entire world that believes that a listening tour is anything but a campaign photo op? On their listening tour, Jeb Bush made the comments that we should give up the values of Ronald Reagan and move more to the center. He said that because he believes that would bring in a larger tent for Republicans.

Mitt Romney put his foot in his mouth on this “tour”. He was shown a list of important Republicans. On the list was Governor Palin of Alaska. Mr. Romney said that she did not belong on the list of important Republicans. Thereby breaking Ronald Reagan’s 11^th commandment, thou shalt not speak ill of another Republican. That was a particularly dumb move on his part. She is an important player in the Republican game at this point in time. She may ultimately fall out and be what Mr. Romney says she is, but we do not know that at this time. She may also be important enough to be on the ticket in 2012 in either spot. I should say at this point that I contributed to Mitt Romney’s campaign for President in 2008. I believed he was the best person to be President in 2008 and still do.

But, just because I support a person does not mean that I cannot see their flaws. In 2008, Mitt had a problem of being too stiff. He had a hard time taking off his tie and connecting with the people. He had a hard time just being himself in public. That got better right at the end, but it was too late. Right now, he is quite comfortable in the public eye. Had he been this comfortable in 208, he would have been the nominee. I also see the mistake in criticizing Governor Palin. She is obviously working on polishing up her resume to be ready for a run at the Presidency in 2012. This comment will come back to haunt him in the 2012 race, especially if it comes down to the two of them.

The biggest question the Republicans have to answer is who shall lead the party? The person that leads the party will be the face of the party. That person’s values will also become the values associated with the Republican Party. It is critical that Republicans pick a good leader with good values. We cannot have a repeat of Independents and Democrats voting for our leader. That led to John McCain and disaster. I am not saying John McCain is a bad person. I am just saying he was the wrong candidate at that time. Against the nimbler Obama, McCain stood no chance. McCain stood on some principles that made no sense. He voluntarily tied his hands and would not return fire when it counted.

My choice in a leader should have a clear vision of what a conservative should be. That leader should articulate the conservative position in such a way that people get excited about being a conservative. The leader should not be defensive about being a conservative. My leader should believe in and support liberty for Americans and others. My leader should talk about releasing the power of private ownership of businesses. In other words, my leader should be everything Barack Obama is not.

I think we have a good selection of people to pick from. In my mind, the most polished and ready candidate is Mitt Romney. I am biased as I supported him in the past. We have a couple of potential stars in Sarah Palin and Bobby Jindal. They needed some seasoning in 2008. Sarah was a better speaker than Bobby. Bobby probably has a better resume. The others on the list like, Jeb Bush, Governor Huntsman of Utah and Mike Huckabee have more serious flaws. There will not be a “perfect” candidate. No candidate will completely emulate Ronald Reagan, but they do not have to. The one that best matches their potential will be the ultimate winner. We can win the White House in 2012. All we have to do is select our “Best” candidate, not a perfect candidate.

On the way to work today, Dennis Prager was talking about 6 solar towers at the Long Beach Airport. The six towers have three panels each. These towers will produce enough power to run 120 laptop computers. According to Dennis, the towers are exceedingly ugly. For the blemish on the scenery, it seems a poor investment. You have those six towers that look terrible and only produce enough power to support up to 120 laptops. That is only 20 laptops each. That seems hardly worth it.

That is the problem with the left. They always seem to know what is best for you. The best for you always makes it worse for you and better some place you will never be. Dennis’ example was that in order to achieve energy independence, we have to put up with these ugly towers. Yet, the northeast corner of Alaska, where no human will ever visit, is left pristine. The justification is that it is better for the environment that it be left pristine. The problem with that argument is the caribou, the primary animal in that environment, loves the Alaska pipeline. The caribou population exploded after the Alaska pipeline was installed. The reason is the pipeline provides warmth and shelter. Both are in extremely short supply in that part of Alaska. The warmth and shelter allow the caribou to survive and thrive. We can assume the same would be true in the Arctic National Wildlife area that the drilling would take place. But, the left knows more than the caribou or us.

The towers also say that they will save carbon dioxide. We need carbon dioxide in the air. Calling carbon dioxide a pollutant is like calling oxygen a pollutant. Plants require carbon dioxide to live. They make oxygen and sugar from carbon dioxide. If we start removing all the carbon dioxide out of the air under the guise that it will lower the temperature, the plants will all die and so will we. We now have carbon dioxide levels that are near starvation levels for plants. They can handle much more oxygen. Their systems can handle up to 6% carbon dioxide in the air. It has been that in the past. Carbon dioxide has little to nothing to do with the temperature of the earth, anyway.

Wind farms are another darling of the left. It takes many square miles of land to equal one nuclear power plant. Then, if the wind does not blow the wind power plant is worthless. The nuclear power would put out electricity 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. When I have driven through the wind farms in California, many windmills are not working. That is because it is expensive to maintain windmills in working order to get maximum results. Nuclear power is also not cheap, but it is reliable. Nuclear power plants are also clean and almost pollution free. Wind farms tend to kill a lot of birds with the turning blades. They are developing expensive systems that can prevent birds from hitting the blades, but that is an additional expense. Also, liberals do not want wind farms anywhere near where THEY happen to be. Liberals do not mind putting it in your backyard, just not in theirs.

Another source of power that is relatively cheap and is extremely clean is hydro power. The liberals absolutely hate hydro power. You would think that they would love hydro power because it does not cause pollution. They hate it because the river has been stopped and that is not natural. They want most if not all dams removed so that rivers can run free and unimpeded. The fact that most of our food is produced because of water that is stored behind these dams does not seem to matter to them. When it comes to choosing between farmers and fish, the fish always win if a liberal is in charge. The farmers can starve and liberals do not care. If the fish has any problem, the liberals have big problems with that. When we start running out of food because of liberals giving all our water to the fishes and other wildlife or removing our dams, maybe they will rethink their values. I doubt it.

When I worked for the Soil Conservation Service/Natural Resources Conservation Service, I came into contact with quite a few environmentalists. Most of them had a couple of things in common: First, they knew absolutely nothing about how the environment works, but thought they knew everything; second, anything that benefitted wildlife was good, anything that benefitted the farmer/rancher was bad. Even when you would show them that both sides would benefit by doing a recommended procedure, they would balk if it meant that even one cow was allowed on the ground. That was just madness. They would settle for less wildlife habitat, if they could remove the cow from the land. It was crazy how single minded they were. As a result, I came away with a very negative opinion of the environmental movement. That is because I am a trained Environmental Scientist.

We now have these single-minded environmentalists in charge of our government agencies. What will happen to those agencies over the next four years as policies get put in place that are unscientific and unsound remains to be seen. I expect to see the environment of the United States be worse off in four years than it is today because of all the new environmental policies. The EPA already has stepped in it by calling carbon dioxide a pollutant. Any freshman biology student knows that was a stupid idea.

Prior to the election on November 4, 2008, Europeans were polled and 58% said they would like to see a weaker America. A larger percentage said they liked Barack Obama. Well, they got their wish. Barack Obama is the President of the United States. He is projecting weakness wherever he goes. Our friends have noticed. Our enemies have noticed. Unfortunately, most of our own country has not noticed.

Recently I wrote about how the leadership of this country is a bunch of cowards. I still believe that. The Obama administration has not given me any indication that they have any backbone at all. But, what else would you expect from a liberal Democrat? I do not know, but I believe that the promotion of political officers over fighting officers has accelerated. Political officers have been getting promoted faster than fighting officers for a long time. As a result, our officer corps is heavily laden with politicians not men who can lead an army.

We have been in this situation before and it always cost us a lot of lives before we got things straightened out. During the Civil War, it wasn’t until President Lincoln found General Grant that he got it right. That took him three years and many thousands of men lost. During World War II we had political leaders in the armed forces prior to the war. As a result, our military was not ready to fight. We lost decisively in the early battles of the war. It wasn’t until we found fighting leaders that we finally started winning.

Right now, when we find a fighting leader in our Army or Marines, he is put up on charges of misconduct. The political officers do that because a fighting officer comes in and takes charge. So, they have to take him out any way that they can. They nit pick battle reports and find any excuse to pull our fighting officers in on charges. That way they have a harder time for promotion or they get removed from the military altogether. The political types avoid fighting at all costs.

I wonder what would happen if we were attacked during the Obama administration. I believe that our military would fight as well as possible. The problem is usually the leadership, not the soldiers on the ground. In every time that we were unprepared for war, the individual soldier was the best. The generals that were leading the soldiers were not prepared to actually lead men into combat. That was the problem. I wonder how prepared our military leadership really is. I know that they will say that they are prepared. But, I mean when the chips are down, what would they do? That is something that can never be answered without being put in that situation.

I do know that their political leaders in Washington will have the urge to cut and run at the first shot. What would our military do if our President and other political leaders abandoned them? Would they stand tall and defend the country regardless of the cowardice of the leadership? Or would they succumb to the contagious cowardice that overcame the political leadership? I know that at least there would be some that would stand tall and fight to the last. I would hope that the number standing tall would include all of them. You can never count on political leaders because they have a tendency to bend with the strongest wind. Political generals may be the same. I do not know.

I am just throwing this out as a thought question. I fully support the military. My father served in the 99^th Infantry as a Second Lieutenant during WW II. My mother worked as a Secretary in an Admiral’s office in San Francisco during WW II. My father’s primary battle was the Battle of the Bulge. Other members of my family have fought in every war from the Revolutionary War to WW II, most as officers. I did not serve in the military because I flunked the physical. My brother was too young to serve in Vietnam. I am also a student of military history and always like to ask the why and how questions. This is pure speculation. But I have thought about it for a few days and it had to get out.

We are in great danger of losing the great nation called the United States of America. She has been in decline for most of my life. I remember when political correctness first poked its head up. At that time, we laughed about it and said it would never catch on. We would even make jokes about how stupid political correctness terms were. Now, we are smothered by the restrictions of political correctness. It does not seem funny any longer. I feel like Gulliver in his travels when he was tied down by the people of Lilliput when I try to speak.

The Constitution which led this country for 165 years was first ignored by Franklin Roosevelt. Each President and Congress since then has followed what parts of the Constitution they wanted and ignored the parts they wanted to ignore. This has led to the President and Congress totally ignoring the Constitution since January 2009. If all the items that were unconstitutional were cut out of the current budget, the defense department and little else would be covered.

Since the 1940’s, the Supreme Court has even had a hand in loosening the hold of the Constitution on the country. Laws that were Constitutional 20, 30 or 40 years ago are unconstitutional now. The Constitution did not change, the Supreme Court changed. We even have current Supreme Court Justices that believe they can use court cases from other countries to help them decide cases about our Constitution. The other countries have an entirely different set of laws on which their court cases were decided. How can they shed any light on what our cases would be? Our cases should be decided on what the Constitution says, not what you want it to say.

Congress has to stop doing things that sound good. Most of the things that Congress does that sound good are unconstitutional. They are unconstitutional because the Founding Fathers did not want the Federal Government doing those things. They wanted a small government that did a few things well. They did not want a government that did a lot of things badly. The Founders put restrictions in the Constitution to stop the Federal Government from growing too large and stifling the freedom of the citizens of the United States of America.

Alexis de Tocqueville wrote almost 200 years ago that we had a great country and would keep it until we discovered we could pay ourselves out of the government trough. Since Franklin Roosevelt, we have been moving towards the point at which the majority of the public discovers that they can make a living from voting themselves money from the government trough. Last I heard we were approaching 49% that do not pay any income taxes. Once we pass 50%, the country is lost forever. We need to push that number down to maybe 25-30% of the public that are not required to pay taxes. I am not calling for a major tax on the poor, but if you do not pay any taxes you have no stake in the government. If you have no stake in the government, the government is just a way to get money.  

Two other things that are destroying our country is the flood of illegal aliens into the country and the failure to make English the national language. We need to stop the flood of illegal aliens from coming into the country. Legal immigrants should be welcomed with open arms. Illegal immigrants should not be able to get jobs and be forced to leave. There are some issues with illegal aliens and their families that can be dealt with in another post, but in general illegal aliens should leave.

The national language should be English. All ballots should be printed in one language only. All court proceedings and filings should be only legal if they are in English. There should be no, press one for English in phone messages. English is our national language. It is just not the official language. Every country in the world recognizes English as our language, except for us. We have politicians that get all worked up over the Hispanic vote and want to allow Spanish. Spanish is a good language. People should learn a second language and Spanish is a good one to learn. But, anyone coming to this country or living in this country should be required to learn English to vote, drive or have any other benefit of being an American.

If we do these things, we can take the country back. It is not so far gone that we cannot retrieve what we have lost. We cannot wait for our children or grandchildren to do it. By then it will be too late. The time to take action is the 2010 elections. Make a statement in those elections and keep it up in the 2012 elections and we can work our way out of the mess we got ourselves into.

The leaders in this country are a bunch of cowards. Joe Biden is a perfect example of the fearful leadership that we get out of the top leaders in Washington. He said on the Today Show that he would not fly in an airplane, ride a subway, be in a classroom or other enclosed space. That is cowardice, not leadership. Leaders would be getting on planes, riding subways or going into enclosed spaces to show that it is safe. Followers are afraid of their shadow. That is what we have at the top levels of our government today.

School districts all across America are afraid of peanut butter. They are afraid that if one student has an allergy to peanut butter they could have a problem. Rather than dealing with the problem as it comes up, they have the shotgun approach and ban peanut butter. Peanut butter is a great food. It has lots of good nutritional value and kids like it. There are few kids with a peanut butter allergy bad enough to warrant banning peanut butter from a school lunch area.

Doctors are afraid of lawsuits so they run unnecessary tests. That raises the cost of healthcare needlessly. The doctors are afraid that if they do not run every test, the patient will come back to sue them if they do not find something. The doctors should be allowed to treat patients as they need to be treated without the fear of lawsuits. If the doctor is grossly negligent, then that is a different story. But, that would be rare. The over prescribing of tests is rampant and costs us millions each year. Ending that abuse would save Americans millions on health care and make it more affordable for everyone. That would eliminate the call for socialized medicine.

Companies are so afraid of lawsuits that they have ridiculous instructions on packaging. This is a waste of paper to print the instructions. It is a waste of somebody’s time to even think of the ridiculous instruction in the first place. Again, it is fear of lawsuits that put those ridiculous instructions on the packaging. Companies should be able to remove instructions that are obvious.

We also have a hysterical fear of lead. I wonder how I survived childhood. Congress has passed laws restricting lead on things that children would hardly ever come in contact with. The unintended consequences of that law could bankrupt many companies and further deepen this depression that we are in. Lead can be harmful in large amounts. These restrictions make lead levels so low that it can almost not be detected. That is an almost impossible level for some things.

Second hand smoke has been blown up as a fear. Second hand smoke smells bad. Second hand smoke is not good for you, but it is not really dangerous like inhaling from a cigarette. Almost all of the harmful particles have been removed by the filter and the person smoking, so there are few harmful particles in the second hand smoke. I have a reaction to it in that when I am having problems with allergies, second hand smoke almost makes me blind or at least it seems that way. But that is not really dangerous, because I just have to leave the area and I am fine. People that live with smokers and do not smoke have the same rate of lung cancer as those that do not smoke and have no contact with smokers. That would indicate that the fear of second hand smoke is overblown.

Who is leading all these calls to be afraid? It is liberals who are always finding something new to be afraid of. Conservatives rarely ask you to be afraid of something like peanut butter or second hand smoke. I think that liberals wake up in the morning and say, “What can I be afraid of today?” The biggest fear today is the global warming hoax. There are no facts to support global warming. A scientist in the late 1950’s and early 1960’s needed funding for research in the South Pacific. He thought up global warming to justify the need for his research. So, he wrote global warming into his research proposals and the idea caught on. He had no data to support his idea; he just thought it was a good idea. Now, we may destroy the economy because some idiot wanted funding and lied on the grant proposals. What a country.

There was a time, not so long ago, when a politician said, “We have nothing to fear, except fear itself.” What happened to that kind of leader? Where have they gone? We have these wimps that fold at the first sign of danger. I fear for the country if we have another 9/11 type attack. At least on 9/11 we had a strong leader who knew what to do. Now we have two people who are afraid of their shadow. They would go hysterical at the first sign of an attack. This is crazy. We need adults, not kids leading the country.

Barack Obama has now served for 100 days as President of the United States. This has been some sort of a milestone after Franklin Roosevelt had a productive 100 days. Ever since then, Presidents mark the 100 day anniversary and measure their accomplishments/failures. Barack Obama is no exception.

If you are a kool-aid drinking Democrat, the first 100 days could not be better. The United States has changed its foreign policy from one of projecting strength to one of projecting weakness. Liberals believe that other countries will now love us more and peace will reign on the Earth. Barack Obama, as President, has bowed before a foreign ruler for the first time in American History. That was great for liberals as it shows we care about the feelings of other countries. But, bowing before someone indicates that you believe that the person you bow to has more power or authority than you do. Picking a Muslim ruler was a bad choice. Muslims ate it up.

On the domestic front, liberals are beside themselves because every dream they have had for the last 40 years is being realized in the first 100 days. They had been squawking about the deficit being too high under President Bush. But when the deficit swelled by a gazillion percent, they cheered as if their dreams were being realized. The recession, which usually lasts somewhere between 60-90 days, is now approaching 150 days with no end in sight. That is not a problem for the Democrats; it just means another opportunity to add another government program or three.

In summary, for liberals and other assorted Democrats: Barack Obama has been highly successful in his first hundred days. They would like to see this continued.

Now for a real assessment of what has happened. The part that preceded this analysis obviously had rose colored glasses on. The real assessment is that the first hundred days has been the worst in American history. Barack Obama has ignored the Constitution at every turn. He has also made the United States a laughing stock among other countries. There is little he could do to make things worse, except for actually nationalizing everything. He has done everything up to nationalizing our economy.

Let’s look at a couple of specifics to highlight my paragraph above. When Barack Obama took his trip to Europe, he spent the entire trip saying he was sorry. At no time did he stick up for our country and tell the Europeans to stick their plans in their ear. He said we would accept anything they came up with. That is not the mark of the leader of the free world.

When Barack Obama bowed to the King of Saudi Arabia, it was an insult to the American people. American President’s do not bow before foreign rulers. We are independent and equal or superior to any other nation on the planet. We do not bow, nor has any President ever bowed before a foreign ruler until Barack Obama. Bill Clinton was scolded for almost bowing. Barack Obama actually bowed and nobody said boo, except for the conservatives.

Obama and the Democrats have undertaken a full court press against the Constitution. Their Porkulus bill that was supposed to be a stimulus bill was almost entirely unconstitutional. That is not even saying that we do not have the money to pay for that Porkulus bill.

In the first 100 days in office, Barack Obama has managed to lower the United States from the leader of the free world to a second class country. He has spent money from our children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren and great-great grandchildren to accomplish nothing. Our descendents will curse this President and Congress and the people that elected him for that outrage. They will be paying for his stupidity for generations to come, all to achieve Democrat Nirvana.

Barack Obama has managed to take this country from a center-right position to a leftist position in 100 days. That has to be the operation of a shrewd operator. Yet, you see that he gives gifts to foreign leaders that are insults, not gifts. He has so many gaffes that you could fill up a 3 hour movie and still have some left over. He seems to be smart at what he wants to do and completely ignorant of everything else. His staff is just a bunch of people to tell him how good he is. They are completely incompetent. Axelrod seems to be running the country, while Barack Obama seems to do all the photo ops. Barack and Michelle Obama are all over the print media in pictures and articles at how wonderful they are. We are also told how beautiful they are. It is nauseating.

Michael Savage seems to think that we are on the path towards fascism. If that is the case, we need to take the steps necessary to stop those steps. In other words, we need to stand up to the leftists and say, “NO!” That might be enough to put off the truck careening towards the disaster of fascism. We shall see what happens. I fear for my country, I really do. I love this country too much to see it turn into something that I do not recognize. It has already changed more than I would care to see.

On the way to work today, I heard Dennis Prager and Hugh Hewitt debate the pros and cons of the Fair Tax. Dennis Prager generally believes that the Fair Tax would be a good idea. Hugh Hewitt thinks that the Fair Tax is a pie in the sky idea that is impractical.

To review for those of you who are not up to speed on the Fair Tax, the Fair Tax is a consumption tax. A consumption tax is a tax on the things you buy, not an income tax. The income tax would be repealed, so you would get your entire paycheck. Since the government has to have money to pay for things it needs tax revenue. The Fair Tax would take the place of the income tax. Rep. Lindner and Neal Boortz came up with the Fair Tax and say that the rate should be 23% to replace the income tax. So that the lower income people would not have to pay any tax, people would get a “prebate” of what they would be expected to pay in tax for that month. Then, every time you bought something you would pay the tax. If you spend less than your prebate, you made money. If you bought more than your prebate, then you ended up paying the government.

Hugh Hewitt says that the rate for the consumption tax is not 23%, but 30%. I have not read his book, so I will have to take him at his word on how he gets to that point. Neal Boortz and Rep. Lindner go to great lengths in their books to make sure that the 23% figure is shown. They also address the question of whether the rate is 23% or 30%. An economist came out with the 30% figure a few years ago and Neal Boortz explained how that economist got to 30%. The economist was incorrect in how he got to 30%; I do not know how Hugh came up with the figure. I am not really sure on this point, which person is correct. I respect and believe in the honesty of all three men, so I would have to see their arguments placed side by side before I could really determine it for myself.

Hugh Hewitt’s main argument is that the Fair Tax can never be passed. I agree with him on that. There is a lot of power associated with taxes. Congress would have to voluntarily give up a lot of power to vote for the Fair Tax. Since Democrats thirst for power with every breath, they will never in their lifetimes vote for the Fair Tax. Republicans would have to produce all the votes for the bill. That would be unlikely as some Republicans like power almost as much as Democrats. You would have to have a Congress with about 70% Republicans in both Houses to have a chance and that is not likely to happen given the public is generally split 50-50.

Hugh Hewitt thinks that Republicans should support a flat tax as that is more likely to be passed by Congress.  That is correct. There is a far greater chance of a flat tax passing over the Fair Tax. All Republicans could get behind it and you might even be able to persuade some Democrats to follow suit. It is unlikely to get much Democrat support, but even one Democrat is far more than you would get for the Fair Tax.

In conclusion, the flat tax is the more likely solution to the confusion tax situation we have today. Right now, if you take your taxes to 10 tax experts to have them done, you are likely to get at least 6 different answers. With a flat tax, all that would go away. Of course, so would the need to have your taxes done by a CPA. Anyone would be able to write down their income and multiply it by the tax number to come up with how much tax they owed. This plan has a similar problem to the Fair Tax in that Congress would have to give up some power over taxes. Since it is a much smaller amount than the Fair Tax would require, it would have a greater chance of success. Also, it would be a good first step to the Fair Tax if that is your ultimate goal.

If your goal is to have the Fair Tax enacted, to go from our current confusing income tax system to the Fair Tax is a steep jump. To take an intermediate jump to a flat tax and then the Fair Tax would seem reasonable. It would mean a delay of probably a few years, but that should not be a problem. So, anyone who would like the Fair Tax, you should support a flat tax as an intermediate step. Then, you can get people moving in your direction for the final leap to the Fair Tax. Problem Solved!

Late last week, the Swine flu started infecting people in Mexico. Many people have died. The Mexican government has instituted strict rules to stop the spread of this flu. There are about 40 known cases in the United States, with an unknown actual number of infected people. Nobody in the United States has died from this Swine flu. The US government is treating this Swine flu threat from Mexico as a potential disaster, so it has instituted some emergency response funds.

Is this Swine flu really an emergency? Swine flu is flu that we get directly from swine or pigs. The regular flu comes from swine as well. The difference between the regular flu and the swine flu is that the swine flu contains some swine DNA, the regular flu does not. The big difference with this flu is that the regular flu season is over, so this flu comes at a time when we are not expecting to get the flu.

The regular flu that we get every year goes from swine to birds to humans in China. Then human to human contacts move the regular flu around the world each year. When the regular flu is in the swine each year, the flu changes a little bit. This change is the reason that we need flu shots every year. The flu is slightly different and the immunity from last year will not work for this year.

The Swine flu is making a lot of people sick in Mexico. There is a reason there a lot of people that are sick in Mexico. The main reason is that most of those that are infected, and particularly those that die, have a compromised immune system. Their immune system is compromised because their nutritional level is not where it should be. They do not eat a good diet or live in conditions that have adequate sanitary facilities. This allows the flu to spread more rapidly and also allows it to kill.

For those of us in the United States that are healthy should not have much to worry about. There was a Swine flu in 1976 that killed one person directly. It killed hundreds indirectly because of hastily concocted flu vaccine that killed the person, but not the Swine flu itself. The health authorities were predicting millions would get the flu and maybe thousands would die. It did not happen. Based on past history, we should not get too worked up about this Swine flu, either. Swine flu pops up from time to time and gets people sick. A few people die, but it is never the epidemic that people expect.

I am not saying that we have nothing to worry about. People will probably get sick from this flu. The regular flu gets millions of us sick each year and kills thousands, yet we just shrug it off as expected. We expect that kind of result so only about a third of us even bother to get a flu shot. This Swine flu will most likely be much less deadly than any regular flu that we get each year. Those at highest risk are those that have compromised immune systems. People that do not get a proper diet are the most likely to get sick and die. People with normal immune systems might get a mild case of the flu, but would recover nicely. Most people would not even know that they had the Swine flu; they would just think they had a bad cold.

The government is overreacting to this problem. Should we be aware of the Swine flu? Yes. Should we be prepared in case it gets deadly? Yes. Should we marshal all the forces now? No, we should put them on alert. Barack Obama does not want anyone to think that he cannot handle an emergency like Katrina, so he will overreact to every emergency. That shows that he not really up to the job.

This past week, the Obama administration made some of the worst mistakes in their first hundred days. They compromised the security of the country. How did they do that you ask? Well for starters, they released CIA memos detailing the techniques the US has used to get information out of terrorists. That was not bad enough; Barack Obama announced that he would be open to prosecution of the Bush administration people for official actions they took during the last four years. Put the two together and you have a good old fashioned witch hunt.

When the Obama administration released the CIA memos detailing the techniques used to obtain information, they were in a sense giving that information to our enemies. Our enemies now know what we do to get information and can train their people how to resist those same techniques. That means that we will have a harder time getting the information and the information we get would be less reliable. It would be less reliable because the suspect would have been taught how to resist, so he would also have been taught how to give false information in that situation. If we are ever going to be able to extract information from reluctant enemies, we will have to develop new techniques. But, given the current atmosphere in Washington, it is unlikely for at least the next four years. The CIA also knows that it has no support in the White House. It will make intelligence gathering more diffficult because our people will be afraid of the White House.

In releasing the CIA memos, the Obama administration also did something interesting. They redacted all of the information in those CIA memos that would have indicated that the techniques worked. That would have justified the use of the techniques by the CIA officials. Redacting the information puts the CIA and the Bush administration in the worst possible light. Even Obama administration people agree that the techniques worked and we obtained valuable information. Redacting that information was pure politics and nothing else. It had nothing to do with national security.

When Barack Obama announced that he would be open to investigating and prosecuting Bush administration officials, he was placating the rabid left wing of his party. They would like nothing better than having Bush administration people, especially Bush and Cheney, up before Congress to look like fools. The left wants to punish Bush and Cheney or anyone who worked for them, for all the successes of the last eight years. This was really a stupid move on the part of Obama. We do not need a witch hunt that only makes paupers out of low level Bush staffers, creates lots of noise and accomplishes nothing. At best, they might find a person or two who did something wrong. It is not likely to be much, but still it would be wrongdoing. But, it would tie up Congress in hearings for months, maybe years and nothing would get done. On second thought, maybe that is a good thing. If they are doing nothing, they cannot be doing any harm. The problem is the irreparable harm they will do to innocent people just bringing them into testify before Congress.

Obama also lowered our standing in the world by releasing those memos. The people that want to target us on our own soil know that the Obama administration is not serious about security. That means there is a golden opportunity to pull of one or more terrorist operations in major cities. Many people might die because of trying to appease a few rabid dogs on the left for no particular reason.

Foreign countries that want to be the number one power in the world like China and Russia know that with Barack Obama as President, the United States is not serious about national defense. That gives them a golden opportunity to develop the weapons that will give them military superiority over the United States. They would then be the number one power in the world and the world would be a much different place. When England ceded the number one slot to us, there was a peaceful handover of the lead. Both countries had the goal of peace and freedom for all. With Russia and China trying for the top spot, we can expect that this handover of power will not be as peaceful. Also the aftermath will not be as pleasant as the period where England and America ruled as the number one power. God help us all for the next four years and maybe beyond!

One thing you can say about this Obama administration, there is never a dull moment. No matter how fast I try to keep up, I am always falling further behind. It is not that I have lost a step. It is just that they have so many things going on at the same time and each one requires a lot of study to figure out what is going on. Sometimes you have to take a step back and look at the big picture instead of looking at what they are doing to figure out what is going on.

A case where you have to look at the big picture is the suggestion that Barack Obama made that he would be open to prosecution of Bush administration officials for official acts they made during that administration. On the surface this seems like a rather stupid idea. Opening up one administration to possible criminal prosecution for official acts that were legal when they were made is not something you can really do. If something was legal when it was done and the person making the act knew it was legal, making it illegal at some future time does not open that person up for prosecution. It does open that person up for possible defamation before Congress. If that is the goal here, then it will be gladly accepted by the Democrats in Congress. They would like nothing better than to have the Bush administration to run against in 2010. But, I think there might be something more sinister behind all these moves.

What I think is happening is that the move to open up the Bush administration for prosecution is a smoke screen. While everyone is worked up over whether it is a good idea or a bad idea or whether you can or cannot prosecute, you can steal millions, billions or trillions of dollars right from under everyone’s noses. The budget and bailout have so much money in them that there is sure to be fraud and corruption. With numbers those large the fraud and corruption will likely even be at the highest levels of companies that do business with the government. Normal fraud and corruption is done by small operators who skim off some of the money for themselves. With numbers this big, the big operators skim off large amounts for themselves. When the smoke clears from the dust up over the Bush administration, the money will be gone with no way to trace it.

I am not calling any individual a criminal. I am just saying that this dust up over the Bush administration is just the smoke screen needed for some crooked operators to come in and take huge sums of money and walk away with nobody noticing. Now, there would have to be a number of people both in and out of the government that would have to be in cahoots for any of these operations to work. When you work with big numbers, you have to have many people involved. A small operator stealing small amounts almost always works alone. A corporate type stealing a large sum of money usually has a group that works together to steal the large sums of money. The money is then laundered through a number of accounts until there is no way to trace it. After all the laundering, the money mysteriously finds its way into the pockets of the people involved.

With everyone, including and especially the media, watching the Bush administration dust up. It gives anyone with a crooked mind a serious opportunity to take advantage of the situation. If I am wrong, I will be extremely happy. I do not expect to be because I expect a huge amount of fraud and corruption in the budget and bailout efforts of the Democrats. You can always expect Democrats to have messy situations with money, because Democrats do not have standards of behavior. Republicans would have a similar problem with a money pile this big. There are few people honest enough to deal with money amounts in the trillions and not have a desire to take a million or two for themselves. A person that is honest enough will have a strict set of rules that he/she lives by. The number of people that have that strict set of rules and can be trusted with this amount of money are getting smaller all the time.

This week, a poll came out saying that one-third of pre-teens believe that by the time they reach adulthood, there will not be an earth for them to live on. The amounts are even worse among blacks and Hispanics with 75% of blacks believing there will not be an earth for them and 65% of Hispanics believing it. That is how bad the hysteria is over the lie that is global warming or the now accepted term, global climate change. It is ironic that they chose that new name as the global climate is always changing, so if it changes they can claim it was because of man when man had nothing to do with it.

Today, Dennis Prager had a Dr. Ian Pilar, a Professor of Mining Geology from the University of Adelaide in Australia. I am not sure of the spelling on the professor’s name, so if I misspelled it I am sorry. Dr. Pilar just wrote a book called, “Heaven and Earth”. It is a best seller in Australia and is coming out this week in the United States and England.

In Dennis Prager’s interview I learned some interesting facts that I did not know about the earth. According to Dr. Pilar, for about 80% of the time there were not ice caps in the Arctic or the Antarctic. During those times the earth was much warmer and had an abundance of life during those time periods. During the time that we have had ice caps, the life on earth has struggled for existence. This was a fact that I did not know. I knew about the abundance of life, but I did not know about the lack of an ice cap for 80% of the time.

The other fact that Dr. Pilar mentioned was about the ice sheets in the Antarctic and Greenland. Those ice sheets move over the surface of the ground. When they come to a hill, they build up and go over the hill. When they reach the shore, they fall off into the ocean creating ice bergs. All of that was information that I already knew. What he added was the part that I was not fully aware of. He said that the amount of ice that falls off was determined to fall off thousands or millions of years ago. It is not determined by the temperature of the earth at the time it falls off. In fact, the ice breaks off less when the temperature is hotter than when it is colder. That does make some sense as the ice would be more brittle when it is colder.

Dr. Pilar also backed up the information about carbon dioxide that I already knew and added some new wrinkles. He said that as the earth warms, carbon dioxide is released from the soil and the water raising the carbon dioxide level in the atmosphere. As the earth cools, the carbon dioxide is trapped by the soil and the water lowering the carbon dioxide level in the atmosphere. He did say that carbon dioxide plays a part in warming the earth as a greenhouse gas, up to a point. When it reaches a certain point, it ceases to make any difference in warming the earth. That is how the earth has had carbon dioxide levels of 5-6% and not been burned to a cinder. That was something that when he said it, I thought that it made perfect sense based on what I knew had happened in the history of the earth and how plants function.

What all this means is that humans could reduce their carbon dioxide emissions to zero and it would make no difference on the climate. Since as the earth warms, carbon dioxide is released from the water and the soil, we have no control over the amount in the atmosphere. Also, carbon dioxide follows climate changes, not leads climate changes.

That means that all this concentration on carbon dioxide is just silly stuff. It would remain silly stuff if the people that believed it did not have the reins of power in our government. They could impose draconian measures on our economy in the name of climate change and have no impact on the climate at all. It would destroy the America that I love and that is why I have to keep speaking out about this issue.