I can’t remember the last time I watched 60 Minutes; I don’t think it’s been since I returned to the States in 2001. Anyway, the latest “big story” from the CBS Chop Shop was how Karl Rove personally ruined the poor ol’ honest Democratic Governor of Alabama Don Siegelman. Here, take a look (13 minutes and 38 seconds in length):
Such breathtakingly powerful reporting! (Pant, pant)
No wonder they won so many Emmys! Yeah, maybe a long time ago but this is still the network that used forged documents to try and derail President Bush’s reelection campaign.
Well, guess what? Yep, this report on the former Alabama Governor is not all that factual (I know, so hard to believe isn’t it?).
The Gateway Pundit has completely blown the lid off of the pathetically sad “journalistic” mistakes that CBS once again will find itself defending.
I also called on all evangelical and conservative minded citizens to demand that all public funding to PP be stopped immediately. My call for that has become greater today.
Look at what the “pro-family” organization is advocating now:
My good friend JB Williams has written a must-read article at the New Media Journal. Please take the time to read “Why Conservatives Must Vote in 2008″ and then pass it on to all in your address book JB’s dead-on account on why we must vote. His article goes hand-in-hand with my last post “Third Party Smarty.”
The Great Green Hope of Leftie La-La Land is back, and not a minute too soon!
Will he have much of an effect on this year’s election; only time will tell.
Did Ralph Nader hurt Al Gore’s chances of winning Florida in 2000? Absolutely! Did Ralph Nader cost Al Gore the election? If you look at only Florida the answer is yes, but when you cannot even win your home state of Tennessee, which would have handed you the White House, I have a hard time empathizing with the former Vice President.
Third party candidates can indeed siphon off voters; Ross Perot did so in 1992, but that backlash was in response to President George H.W. Bush’s failure to maintain the strong conservative values of his predecessor Ronald Reagan. Perot took 18.91% to Bush’s 37.45% allowing Clinton to win by default with a paltry 43% of the vote.
In 1996, Perot took 8.4% of the vote compared to Dole’s 40.72% and Clinton’s 49.23%. I think it is safe to say that Ross Perot was indeed the GOP spoiler, definitely in 1992.
Ron Paul ran in 1988 but had virturally no impact on the outcome; Bush collected 53.37% to Dukasis’ 45.65%; Paul received 0.47% so he harmed no one.
In 1980 John Anderson made a good showing for himself as a Rockefeller Republican running as an independent collecting 6.61% of the vote compared to Reagan’s 50.75% and Carter’s 41.01%, but again, the third party candidate did not hurt the outcome.
When does it hurt a major party candidate? When the third party candidate is more conservative than the GOP candidate. We’ve shown the effect Ross Perot had on the more moderate Bush and Dole candidacies. George Wallace almost cost Richard Nixon the 1968 election by receiving 13.53% of the vote compared to Nixon’s 43.42% and Hubert Humphrey’s 42.72%. Now the electoral vote wasn’t close, but Wallace still siphoned off 9.9 million votes.
In 1912 the third party candidate actually took second place, former President Teddy Roosevelt running on the Progressive Party beat out incumbent GOP candidate President William Taft 27.4% to 23.17%. Both lost to Democrat Woodrow Wilson’s 41.84%. Now Taft was supposedly the more conservative of the two, but his presidency had caused so much consternation in the business sector that the vote was split almost down the middle.
The point here is that many conservatives are talking about a third party candidate or simply just not voting. That is ridiculous.
Look what Woodrow Wilson brought us: the 16th and 17th Amendments which were a slap in the face of federalism. Wilson brought us the wonderful Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Reserve Board. Wilson also pioneered the failed League of Nations that shaped the Treaty of Versailles that helped usher in Nazism to Germany.
Ross Perot brought us Bill Clinton, twice! Nuff said. Thank you Ross Perot.
As much as conservatives do not like John McCain, and for good reason, we have to not only ensure he gets elected, we have to win back both houses of Congress. And we will not settle for the nonsense of a Republican Congress backing the President if he supports policies that are counter to conservativism. We did that too often for eight years with George Bush but every time we opposed him we won. We will have to do the same with President McCain.
Conservatives, we need to fix the broken house from within. We cannot allow strangers in to do the work we need to do. It’s time to switch from being consumers and become citizens once again. That means you will have to come to realize that little Johnny’s soccer match and little Suzie’s ballet lessons are not more important than who becomes our elected officials. Neither is American Idol.
We have much work to do in the remaining 253 days before the general election. Stay tuned!
It’s true! I just met one and there is a whole organization of them!!
Okay, I apologize for my sad attempt at sarcasm.
Of course there are Christians in Maine and like all our dear brothers and sisters in Christ across this great nation, Maine Christians are working hard to be the “Salt and Light.”
My new friend is Mike Heath and I’ve added his blog site to my blog roll (just click Mike Heath) and I’ve also added the Christain Civic League of Maine’s organizational link to my Christian Activism links.
I encourage you to visit the sites and go through all the links to get an idea of what great work they are doing up in the far Northeast.
If you feel lead to give a donation to their cause there is a PayPal link at their site, but more importantly I ask that you send their information to everyone in your address book so we can add these fine Christian warriors to our prayer lists.
I’m sure you’ve heard of the case of the Maine middle school that wants to give birth control to 11 year old girls, well Mike and his organization are in the midst of this battle. In fact, Mike is being attacked by a civil rights activist because Mike dared to quote Scripture in one of his columns. Of course the activist took what Mike said out of context and is accusing Mike of hate speech.
Beloved, you know how long I’ve been advocating the call of Jesus found in Matthew 5:13-16; that passage is more than just from where the name for this blog came; it is the motivation for it! Well, here is another group faithfully standing in the gap for Christ and we need to come alongside them.
My prayer for this great land is another Great Awakening, but that will only come when we first as individuals allow God to revive each of us. That will result in revival in our families, our neighborhoods, our churches, our communities and counties, then the state, and eventually the country. To believe that is not possible is to doubt the hand of God! Just a reminder:
“If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.” (2 Chronicles 7:14)
David Jeffers, author of “Salt and Light”, is a lay preacher, retired Army Master Sergeant and author of Understanding Evangelicals: A Guide to Jesusland. A Magna Cum Laude graduate of Liberty University where he received his degree in Biblical Studies, Dave frequently comments on the Evangelical perspective of current affairs in the media. Dave has published numerous articles on The New Media Journal and appears regularly on talk radio shows around the country.
Dave wants to thank Rod and Sherri Martin of TheVanguard.org for so graciously and generously sponsoring this blog.
Dave is currently pursuing his Master of Arts Degree in Theological Studies from Liberty Baptist Theological Seminary.
Dave has also developed a seminar titled Our American Christian Heritage, which is available now and can be presented in conjunction with a book signing.
Dave is in the process of revising, expanding, and updating a new hardcover version of his book, Understanding Evangelicals: A Guide to Jesusland. Look for its release some time mid-summer with new chapters on immigration, the environment, and health care.
To interview or schedule Dave for an appearance at your church or civic function, please email him or contact him by cell (850) 565-0993.
Well, they no longer are attempting to hide anything; in fact they are boldly showing how they are single-handedly manipulating the 2008 elections. Tomorrow the NY Times is publishing what most conservatives knew was coming, the long-awaited hit piece on John McCain. Now that McCain has all but wrapped up the nomination they are bringing into question McCain’s integrity and speculating on an alleged affair the Senator had with a lobbyist.
If the NY Times has had this story for weeks and only “sat on it” because of pressure from McCain, they were either grossly negligent in their duties as the watchmen of freedom or they purposely sat on this to wait until McCain secured the nomination so their beloved Democratic Party could regain the White House.
The NY Times knew that a McCain nomination would fracture the Republican Party of its conservative base and they, in my humble opinion, are trying to influence the outcome of this election.
If Bill Kristol has an ounce of respectable conservative blood still running through his veins he’ll resign from this disgraceful newspaper tomorrow.
I owe my readers an apology. On January 5, 2008 in a post I wrote titled “The Real Reagan Conservative” I promised to continue my analysis of all the GOP candidates in light of the definition of Reagan Conservatism. Since we have only Mike Huckabee, Ron Paul, and the presumptive GOP presidential nominee John McCain left, I want to address this subject from a different angle.
I’ve been reading my recently purchased copy of Barry Goldwater’s “The Conscience of a Conservative.” When I ordered my copy from Amazon I thought I was getting a later version, but much to my delight I received an original copy, complete with what appears a bite out of the front edge of the book and yellowed pages. The original printed price of fifty cents on its cover makes the $18.43 I paid for the book all the more valuable, thanks to the Invisible Dogg (the seller).
What is at stake in the upcoming elections is the US Constitution and our liberty it defends. Our Constitution has been under attack for nearly a century and most Americans do not realize this nor do they understand what is at stake. However, I may be wrong…read these words:
“I am convinced that most Americans now want to reverse the trend. I think that concern for our vanishing freedoms is genuine. I think that the people’s uneasiness in the stifling omnipresence of government has turned into something approaching alarm. But bemoaning evil will not drive it back, and accusing fingers will not shrink government.” Barry Goldwater, The Conscience of a Conservative (p. 23)
Senator Goldwater wrote those words 48 years ago and it seems the longing for freedom from the grip of the federal government has only grown stronger. Why is this? It is because we have elected the wrong men and women to represent us. Again I turn to Goldwater:
“The turn will come when we entrust the conduct of our affairs to men who understand that their first duty as public officials is to divest themselves of the power they have been given.” (Goldwater, p. 23)
You’re thinking, “Yeah, right!” As if a politician would vote him or herself less power! Why is that such a foreign idea to most Americans? It is because we have become an entitlement society and we are addicted to the federal feeding trough.
Want proof?
Most people celebrate when they get a nice income tax return as though they’ve received some wonderful windfall from the government or others use their returns as a vacation or luxury item savings plan!
Excuse me, but you are celebrating the return of your confiscated money, used by the federal government free of charge (albeit earning interest you’ll never see!).
Two more points to ponder before I go. What type of candidate is a Reagan Conservative? What type of candidate will work towards limited government? Goldwater again points it out for us:
“It will come when Americans, in hundreds of communities throughout the nation, decide to put the man in office who is pledged to enforce the Constitution and restore the Republic. Who will proclaim in a campaign speech: ‘I have little interest in streamlining government or making it more efficient, for I mean to reduce its size. I do not undertake to promote welfare, for I propose to extend freedom. My aim is not to pass laws, but to repeal them. It is not to inaugurate new programs, but to cancel old ones that do violence to the Constitution, or that have failed in their purpose, or that impose on the people an unwarranted financial burden. I will not attempt to discover whether legislation is needed before I have first determined whether it is constitutionally permissable. And if I should later be attacked for neglecting my constituents’ interests, I shall reply that I was informed their main interest is liberty and that in that cause I am doing the very best I can.”
Brilliant words, so much so that they affected many who would become the stalwarts of the conservative movement; Ronald Reagan, Newt Gingrich, Rush Limbaugh, and Fred Thompson. Many people who espouse Reagan Conservatism are unfamiliar with The Speech so it is with a video excerpt I leave you. Enjoy and be amazed!
Well, did you get that special Valentines Day gift? Did it cost you a lot? Do you ever wonder why the hoopla about Valentines Day?
The history of Valentines Day is actually very interesting and ancient, and contrary to popular myth, it was not invented by Hallmark.
There is a neat website called Birth Verse where you can look up the Bible verse selected for your birthday.
The verse for today is Titus 2:14: “who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works.”
The Apostle Paul was writing to Pastor Titus and explaining to him why it is important to live a godly life and how grace teaches us.
I pray God’s grace continues to instruct each of you who belong to Christ. If you do not, then why not search the real meaning behind the signs at the sporting events, John 3:16? Now that is true love!
Michelle Vu of The Christian Post has written an excellent article on the effects that liberal christianity is having on the threat of radical Islam. Michelle interviewed Patrick Sookhdeo, the director of the Institute for the Study of Islam and Christianity and a former, and Mr. Sookhdeo states:
If the U.S. church goes the way of Europe and embraces liberalism in its theology then it will embrace liberalism in its life…and if it embraces liberalism in its life then the church will die and not only will the church die, but society around it will also die.
Looks like we could use a lot more Salt and Light!
Guerra states this in the article: To that effect, starting at the county level, conservatives must agglutinate together in 501(c) 3 associations to constitute an organized base of operations in each county of the nation. Those county conservative associations would have as their two main functions to work as (a) conservative-information clearinghouses and (b) conservative-activism hubs.
This is an excellent idea and is already being accomplished with the National Federation of Republican Assemblies (NFRA) at different levels of success across America. Additionally, TheVanguard.org (full disclosure: the sponsor of this blog) is mobilizing materiel, members, and monies to directly confront the Leftist movement that has already greatly infected all aspects of America.
Currently the national NFRA website is down now, but when it returns please check there to see if there is a chapter in your area and if not, start one!
Also, Newt Gingrich has some excellent ideas at his website and if you’ve not seen his speech at CPAC, I highly recommend it.
Folks, we have a lot of work ahead of us and if we put as much energy into the resurgence of conservatism as we put into whining about its demise, we will once again win the day.
First of all, Buzz used part of Eddie’s letter Hope Rides Alone, but more importantly, Buzz outlines how the Left is doing everything in its power to make sure we lose the war on terror. I cannot personally allow that too happen; it cost my family too much.
If anyone actually thinks that teaching the GOP a lesson and letting the Dems takeover the White House is a good idea, you need to read this book and then get back to me.
Buy a copy for yourself and if you have a teen going off to college definitely give him or her a copy for his or her dorm room desk. Buzz’ chapter on America’s universities by itself is worth the cost of the book.
There is more at stake than I fear people actually realize.
So, with Mitt Romney out and Mike Huckabee needing to win 83.3% of the remaining delegates to secure the nomination, does anyone doubt that John McCain will be the Republican nominee? I will be writing in the near future on what I see as the cause of the state of the Republican Party and what “We the People” can do about it.
Until then, I’ve posed some questions that I am inviting everyone to post their comments and you can throw out other food for thought. Let’s get the dialogue started.
Rules first; no nasty talk, no name-calling, no disparaging a candidate’s character. This is the grown-up blog. If you want to curse, belittle, make fun, talk about someone’s physical characteristics, that is not welcome here. There are plenty of blog sites out there for that, or you can start your own. I want substantive comments and respectful points and counterpoints.
Here are some questions to get the ball rolling:
How is it that we’ve come to this point?
What do we as a party do now?
Do you care if we lose the White House?
What about the Supreme Court nominees?
Are you willing to allow the country to suffer to just to teach the Republican Party hacks a lesson?
What, if anything, can John McCain do to win your vote?
Tomorrow I will be on Greg Allen’s The Right Balance tomorrow at 11:50 am EST. You can tune in live on the internet or catch it again at 10 pm - Midnight EST. You can also listen to a rebroadcast at Iowa News Talk beginning at 3 pm EST.
Briefly, looking at the Democratic Super Tuesday outcome, delegate count went to Clinton but momentum clearly is in the Obama camp. I watched him again last night and oh how I wish he was a conservative. If I did not know about his radical socialist leanings (which the large majority of his supporters do not), I would gladly vote for this guy. Alas he is the Republicans worse nightmare. If Hillary wins we have a great chance of defeating her and if she wins the White House I think she’ll only serve one term. Obama, however, could be our President for the next 8 years. That means we conservatives must energize to defeat whoever is the Democratic nominee.
Too much information and not enough time this morning to do extensive analysis of the GOP outcome, but obviously John McCain had a big night as did Mike Huckabee. I actually estimated McCain to have 880 delegates; he currently has 613 with only 59 (56 McCain; 3 Romney) of the 170 California delegates awarded. McCain could easily reach 700 by time the counting is done.
This means that Louisiana is huge for Romney. Louisiana has 47 delegates up for grab which are apportioned by votes received. Regardless the delegate count, Romney needs to win the popular vote to maintain viability. As Huckabee said last night, this is a two man race and Huckabee is one of them. I can’t find any current polling data for Louisiana at the moment, but Huckabee has to be quite popular there and if he squeaks out another win and will indeed be more than just a spoiler.
Clearly March 4 is the big day; I think Romney and Huckabee both stay around until then. Texas has 137 and it is a winner take all primary. Obviously, this is a very coveted price. We still have the Washington and Wisconsin Primaries in two weeks and although there are not a huge amount of delegates there, again momentum is a key ingredient.
Well, I’ve simply run out of time; I’ll get back to you all in the next few hours or by tomorrow and try to add my two cents to the huge pile of punditry.
Many pundits had McCain wrapping up the nomination tonight after his victory last week in Florida. I told my brother-in-Christ and fellow writer J.B. Williams that while McCain would come out of Super Tuesday the front runner, he would be a long way from wrapping up the nomination.
As of 10pm central time McCain is a long way away from wrapping up the nomination and may come out with only 600-700 delegates, much less than the 881 I estimated he would have.
Tomorrow morning should be quite revealing. I’ll post something in the morning before heading off to work around 8:30.
In this interview Ann states: “McCain’s record is as bad and liberal as Hillary’s.” The American Conservative Union rates Senators McCain and Clinton’s 2006 legislative voting record 65 and 8 respectively. While I agree that Senator McCain leaves much to be desired when it comes to the conservative agenda, to equate McCain to Clinton’s liberalism is at best a stretch and at worst hysteric hyperbole.
Ann says, “And don’t tell me McCain is better on the war. Campaigning in front of Code Pink types, Hillary has repeatedly said she will hit terrorists hard, and hedged her bets (thereby losing votes) on whether she’d execute a quick pullout from Iraq.”
Is Ann actually praising Hillary?!! Ann, may I recommend a website to you? On this website you will find the following statement: Starting Phased Redeployment within Hillary’s First Days in Office. What is this website you ask? It is the Issues Section on the Hillary For President website!
Regardless of the military situation in Iraq, Hillary states on her website, “She would direct them to draw up a clear, viable plan to bring our troops home starting with the first 60 days of her Administration.”
Comparatively, on John McCain’s website we read, “A greater military commitment now is necessary if we are to achieve long-term success in Iraq.”
Sorry Ann, and despite your admonition “And don’t tell me McCain is better on the war,” it is clear that McCain is better on the war; he doesn’t want to “cut and run” from Iraq; Hillary does.
As to whether the GOP will lose its soul if it nominates McCain, Coulter replies, “Neither the Republican Party nor the nation will be likely to recover inasmuch as it will lead to an end to a takeover by Mexico and 30 years of Democratic rule.” Does she really believe this? Is she saying that the already turning tide within the conservative movement, the ever-growing disenchantment with the present-day conservative leaders will not result in a new conservative revolution? If she truly believes this she needs some new tea leaves.
Clearly, the GOP is in a shambles as is the conservative movement, but unlike we did after 1964 with Goldwater’s loss, I do not believe that it will take conservatives some 26 years to coalesce around a strong conservative candidate.
The advent of the Internet in general and blogs specifically will allow a strong grassroots movement to raise up and demand that the GOP start nominating and supporting true conservative candidates. That is already apparent with such organizations as TheVanguard.org (the sponsor of this blog) and the National Federation of Republican Assemblies (NFRA).
It is apparent from all the gnashing of teeth in the conservative movement that we are going to have to re-look our dependency on talk radio, conservative punditry, and Christian monolithic groups to do our bidding for us.
That’s what I will be writing about in the future.
“Bad politicians are sent to Washington by good people who don’t vote.” William E. Simon
Those are very relevant words by the late Secretary of the Treasury of both the Nixon and Ford Administrations.
Our greatest gift from our Constitution is our right to vote. The greatness in the gift is that it comes from God, not from man. We have indeed been “endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
Liberty is not a gift from man, nor does it come from our constitution. Our constitution is merely a covenant, a contract between the elected and the represented. More American blood as been spilled in the preservation of liberty than for any other cause. It has been spilled not only on our continent or for our country, but around the world and for other countries.
My son gave his life for the safety of our country and also for the country of Iraq. Eddie wrote the following in his article “Freedom Feels Good”:
The Iraqis are capable of free government but we cannot call it quits because we think they aren’t. Someone has to believe in them, someone has to help them out; someone has to provide the example. We are showing it to them. Some have taken it, many haven’t, but it will spread…because freedom feels good.
The whole world is watching us. If we choose not to vote, will the whole world continue to believe in us? The pundits were excitedly describing the massive GOP voter turnout here in Florida and statewide it was 41.7%, the largest turnout was in Lee County with 57.4% and the lowest was in Dixie County it was 29.5%. In comparison, estimates for Iraqi voter turnout in the parliamentary elections in January 2005 were estimated to be near 70%.
I quoted Charles Finney in my book about our Christian duty to vote:
Charles G. Finney, the great 19th Century revivalist credited with spearheading the Second Great Awakening in America, said this about Christians participating in politics:
“The church must take right ground in regard to politics . . . The time has come for Christians to vote for honest men and take consistent ground in politics, or the Lord will curse them . . . God cannot sustain this free and blessed country that we love and pray for, unless the Church will take right ground. Politics are part of religion in such a country as this, and Christians must do their duty to God . . . God will bless or curse this nation according to the course Christians take in politics.
Some will say that there are not any honest men running in the primaries and that may be true, but to overcome the issue of not wanting to vote for the “lesser of two evils”, may I recommend you do what Frank Salvato has written about in his latest editorial?
Why don’t we vote for the better candidate?
To all the states involved in Super Tuesday: the whole world is watching.
No pressure…exercise your right to vote. It was bought with blood.
Who would have thought on February 1, 2008 the GOP would have all three strong conservative candidates out of the race for over two weeks, and remaining are John McCain/Feingold/Kennedy/Lieberman, Mitt Romney who transformed into a conservative right before our eyes in the last year (although his record is suspect at best), a populist in Mike Huckabee, and Ron Paul…well, you know.
Yesterday I was writing about the chaos in the conservative movement and today we have moved into the absolute absurd. Watch this video:
I never thought I would enjoy watching Alan Colmes, but he was hilarious! The world can come to an end because I see Ann Coulter and Alan Colmes practically arm and arm.
We have a bunch of broken pieces in our movement and it’s going to take a lot of work to patch it all back together again.
