Positive Liberty

If the Republican Party would’ve taken my advice, John McCain would’ve won the election and the Republicans would’ve won back the House.

Here’s the advice I was offering: Oppose the bailout.

For the “maverick” in this race, it would’ve been the most “mavericky” thing he could’ve done. But he went along with the insider establishment — which, btw, is his real standard operating procedure.

For the House GOP it would’ve been a return to the apex of the Gingrich-led revolution. The leaders of that revolution, Newt Gingrich and Dick Armey, both no longer in the House, opposed the bailout.

But the Dow has gone down 1900 points since the bailout. The S&P has declined more than 250 points. GM and Ford are teetering.

And now, the same media that drank the bailout Kool-Aid — Continue Reading »

I think mixed metaphors are the bee’s pajamas. Matt Taibbi amusingly crowned Thomas Friedman the leader of seriously mixed metaphors. If you enjoy this English language quirk, Friedman is your savant. He simply grabs metaphors by the horns, and runs with them.

I didn’t watch much of it, but I’m told that Barack Obama had his own rocket surgery moment last night. Obama said that John McCain thought that he (Obama) was, “green behind the ears.”

I love that! Does that mean he spends his time thinking about environmental issues, or that he’s good at gardening? You really have to dig in your feet to figure that one out.

But Obama is largely style, and mixed metaphor is a big part of his substance.

Obama: “This is the moment when we must defeat terror and dry up the well of extremism that supports it.” As David Frum points out, “When you try to use a well to support something, that thing tumbles 30 or 40 feet below ground and lands with a splash.”

Hardball delenda est.

People are upset over the insertion of “sweeteners” (a.k.a., pork) placed in the bailout bill. They should be.

But twice now, I’ve heard people say, “Maybe we needed this bailout, but what really upsets me is all the junk they threw in there.”

What!? …the Congressional leadership adds unrelated items to their bills to acquire more votes from Congresscritters who are using those taxpayer dollars to reward their friends and supporters or buy votes back home? The horror! Who ever heard of such a thing?

Have these people been living under rocks?

This concern is akin to asking Mrs. Lincoln, “Other than the gunshot, how did you enjoy the play?” After all, the gunshot was $700 billion. The “sweeteners” are just noise, in comparison.

John McCain, also didn’t get it. As the deal heated up, his public rhetoric was about vetoing earmarks. Earmarks! Great, take $30 billion worth of discretion away from Congress and give it to the Executive Branch, saving the taxpayers little if anything, while you blow $700 billion (to empower the Bankers).

Perhaps after he loses the election, he can take a job at Goldman Sachs or the Federal Reserve — or better yet, on CNBC (with the other Kool-Aid drinkers).

Hardball delenda est.

It’s been 21 days since I posted to the blog. A new computer install and a road trip/speaking gig on behalf of DownsizeDC.org have consumed my time of late. I also started, but haven’t yet completed longer blog posts on the homeschooling issue (the big debate that was raging here three weeks ago). But I promised I’d keep you posted on Bob Barr’s lawsuit to keep McCain and Obama off the ballot because they filed late.

And I predicted that Texas judges would say, “Don’t worry Mr. Obama and Mr. McCain: You two are exceptions to our ‘late-filing, no ballot access, no exceptions‘ rule.”

I mean, it’s not like McCain and Obama are from minority political parties, right? Ballot access laws are for Libertarians, Constitutionalists, Greens, or even the Female Circumcision Party.

Well, the expected happened. The Texas Supreme Court ruled that Obama and McCain are allowed on the ballot — and wait till you see their explanation!

Here’s more of the story as reported at NolanChart.com… Continue Reading »

While showing a video about FDR to my presidency class today, I was struck by the narrator’s statement that, “despite the pressing issues facing the country in 1932, the campaign was based almost entirely on personality.”

I’ve been steamed lately about McCain’s faux outrage over Obama’s lipstick on a pig comment. The Republicans, lately, seem to have consistently avoided real issues and focused instead on manufacturing such faux’t rage, and turning the election into nothing more than a personality contest.

So it’s good to get a little perspective and realize that our politics really hasn’t sunk to a new low–presidential elections have nearly always been about personality rather than issues. (Hey! Did you hear Jefferson’s been miscegenatin’!?)

There’s been a lot bytes spent on Sarah Palin rumors of late. Like, for example, Sarah Palin pretended to give birth to the child her daughter actually bore, to cover up family/political shame. Even the blog that got that incorrect rumor started, and self-admittedly damaged its credibility in the process, is conceding the point.

Inconveniently, two more of these rumors seem to be going down in flames. Continue Reading »

I’ve become pretty cynical over the years, but down inside I’m still sort of the naive little country boy, and that’s where John McCain’s acceptance speech hit me, deep inside, right in the gut, and it made me sick. Continue Reading »

Hi. My name is Jim, and I have a political addiction. I can’t stand any political party. I don’t like either of the major candidates. I’m so disgusted by the process that I rarely vote for humans (I don’t trust their kind; but I do vote on ballot initiatives, particularly when I can vote against a levy). However, I can’t help watching the coverage and offering my opinion. It’s a disease. And I thank you for being part of my therapy. After I write this, I’ll be able to go back to work!

Last week, I wrote that gridlock was the best of bad alternatives (“Why I Don’t Want United Government”) — that both candidates represented great evils, but McCain would accomplish less with a Democratic Congress (Democrats controlling Capitol Hill seems inevitable). This is an argument that I think the Republicans could use to great advantage.

Jack Welch, former CEO of GE (who thinks Clinton was a good President), appeared on CNBC’s Kudlow & Co. last night and he too made a case against “united government.” He said the worst alternative was Continue Reading »

This post is really about the importance of Ohio and Colorado. These are the two states to watch in this Presidential election. If Obama wins either state, it probably means that he wins the Presidency. Continue Reading »

Much has been made, already, both on TV and the Internet, about Sarah Palin’s support for “teaching creationism.” I’ll come back to her in a moment.

I believe Darwinian evolution is the best explanation of humanity’s natural history. I didn’t arrive at that view easily. I was raised to believe in a literal six day creation. But as soon as I investigated a bit, I found out how unlikely and untenable this idea is.

However, I didn’t stop my investigation there. When I realized that six day creation didn’t happen, I began reading up on Intelligent Design. I had high hopes for this viewpoint. Long story short, in the Summer of 2005 (I know, such a long time ago, right?) I figured out that ID was bunk.And I endeavored to begin to understand better how “Darwin’s Machine” worked.

I am not alone. As I’ve written about on this blog, tens of thousands of conservative Christians have made a journey similar to mine during this 21st century. We recognize evolution is NOT a threat to our faith (much as some might wish to make it so).

Fresh from my enlightenment, I outlined some of the things that were influential in that process on my old blog. But I’d like to say something more philosophical here. Continue Reading »

The Democrats are likely to expand their lead in the House and the Senate. Obama is running a Great Society liberal’s campaign. Uniting both ends of Pennsylvania Ave. would be bad.

Gridlock is good.

Until Obama flip-flopped on the FISA vote, and it became apparent the Democrats didn’t understand the need to stop their silly oil drilling ban, I liked Obama better than McCain.

Now I don’t like either of the leading candidates, and I think the results will be more bad than good whichever one of them wins.

I am very opposed to the Bush foreign policy, and I think McCain will continue that. I also hate McCain’s positions on carbon taxes and political speech. He’ll have aid and comfort from the Democrats on these positions.

But McCain will, overall, accomplish far less than Obama will. And it’s that bi-partisan (or uni-party) accomplishment that I’m really concerned about. I don’t want both ends of Pennsylvania Ave. to come together to, “get things done.” When they get thing done, it costs us money, time, and hassle. It restricts our choices. It takes away our rights and liberties.

Gridlock is good.

What’s at stake in this election is the level of legislative success. Barack Obama would be able to get a great deal more of his agenda passed than would John McCain.

And here’s what Obama’s going to do once elected, that will have permanent, detrimental effects… Continue Reading »

Quote: “Support for Bob Barr brings too much uncertainty to the call.” - John Zogby

One of the two best pollsters in the country, John Zogby, in a recent survey of ten “battleground states,” has some surprising poll numbers to report for Libertarian Bob Barr (who will appear on 49 state ballots).

What does this mean?

Continue Reading »

Some random thoughts…

Purpose Driven Dialogue

Rick Warren, pastor of mega-church Saddleback and author of “The Purpose Driven Life” and “The Purpose-Driven Church,” was declared by one news outlet (I cannot recall who now) to be the new Billy Graham. Why? Is it because he preaches the gospel? Not really. It’s because he’s friends with presidential candidates on both sides of the aisle — friend of the next president. It’s also because he’s perceived as being less partisan and less divisive than the likes of the late-Jerry Falwell, the late-D. James Kennedy, Pat Robertson, James Dobson, and David Barton. It’s because he seems like, and probably is a nicer guy.

I, for one, would like to see a new kind of evangelical leader — one who sees his role as “afflicting the comfortable, and comforting the afflicted.” There may actually be a couple of them. I’m aware of at least one such individual. But it’s a lot harder to climb the prestige ladder if that’s your attitude. People call you a radical, a liberal, and unpatriotic.

American Evangelicalism has become hotter and stinkier than the Gehenna dump.

Being Rick Warren gets you on all the right shows. Being James Dobson raises you an army and lots of money. Being a critic gets you neither.

Does this mean we can see Rick Warren’s purpose?

I don’t know. Actually, there are some things I like about Rick Warren. I’ll conclude this piece by mentioning one of them.

Brayton’s Reprobation

Our PL colleague over at his real big blog wrote, Continue Reading »