"That's Saul, folks!"Michigan Republican Party Blog

Peggy Noonan calls Republicans out...read it.

http://online.wsj.com/article/declarations.html

Pity Party
May 16, 2008; Page A11
Big picture, May 2008:

The Democrats aren't the ones falling apart, the Republicans are. The Democrats can see daylight ahead. For all their fractious fighting, they're finally resolving their central drama. Hillary Clinton will leave, and Barack Obama will deliver a stirring acceptance speech. Then hand-to-hand in the general, where they see their guy triumphing. You see it when you talk to them: They're busy being born.

The Republicans? Busy dying. The brightest of them see no immediate light. They're frozen, not like a deer in the headlights but a deer in the darkness, his ears stiff at the sound. Crunch. Twig. Hunting party.

The headline Wednesday on Drudge, from Politico, said, "Republicans Stunned by Loss in Mississippi." It was about the eight-point drubbing the Democrat gave the Republican in the special House election. My first thought was: You have to be stupid to be stunned by that. Second thought: Most party leaders in Washington are stupid – detached, played out, stuck in the wisdom they learned when they were coming up, in '78 or '82 or '94. Whatever they learned then, they think pertains now. In politics especially, the first lesson sticks. For Richard Nixon, everything came back to Alger Hiss.

They are also – Hill leaders, lobbyists, party speakers – successful, well-connected, busy and rich. They never guessed, back in '86, how government would pay off! They didn't know they'd stay! They came to make a difference and wound up with their butts in the butter. But affluence detaches, and in time skews thinking. It gives you the illusion you're safe, and that everyone else is. A party can lose its gut this way.

Many are ambivalent, deep inside, about the decisions made the past seven years in the White House. But they've publicly supported it so long they think they . . . support it. They get confused. Late at night they toss and turn in the antique mahogany sleigh bed in the carpeted house in McLean and try to remember what it is they really do think, and what those thoughts imply.

And those are the bright ones. The rest are in Perpetual 1980: We have the country, the troops will rally in the fall.

"This was a real wakeup call for us," someone named Robert M. Duncan, who is chairman of the Republican National Committee, told the New York Times. This was after Mississippi. "We can't let the Democrats take our issues." And those issues would be? "We can't let them pretend to be conservatives," he continued. Why not? Republicans pretend to be conservative every day.

The Bush White House, faced with the series of losses from 2005 through '08, has long claimed the problem is Republicans on the Hill and running for office. They have scandals, bad personalities, don't stand for anything. That's why Republicans are losing: because they're losers.

All true enough!

But this week a House Republican said publicly what many say privately, that there is another truth. "Members and pundits . . . fail to understand the deep seated antipathy toward the president, the war, gas prices, the economy, foreclosures," said Rep. Tom Davis of Virginia in a 20-page memo to House GOP leaders.

The party, Mr. Davis told me, is "an airplane flying right into a mountain." Analyses of its predicament reflect an "investment in the Bush presidency," but "the public has just moved so far past that." "Our leaders go up to the second floor of the White House and they get a case of White House-itis." Mr. Bush has left the party at a disadvantage in terms of communications: "He can't articulate. The only asset we have now is the big microphone, and he swallowed it." The party, said Mr. Davis, must admit its predicament, act independently of the White House, and force Democrats to define themselves. "They should have some ownership for what's going on. They control the budget. They pay no price. . . . Obama has all happy talk, but it's from 30,000 feet. Energy, immigration, what is he gonna do?"

* * *

Could the party pivot from the president? I spoke this week to Clarke Reed of Mississippi, one of the great architects of resurgent Republicanism in the South. When he started out, in the 1950s, there were no Republicans in his state. The solid south was solidly Democratic, and Sen. James O. Eastland was thumping the breast pocket of his suit, vowing that civil rights legislation would never leave it. "We're going to build a two-party system in the south," Mr. Reed said. He helped create "the illusion of Southern power" as a friend put it, with the creation of the Southern Republican Chairman's Association. "If you build it they will come." They did.

There are always "lots of excuses," Mr. Reed said of the special-election loss. Poor candidate, local factors. "Having said all that," he continued, "let's just face it: It's not a good time." He meant to be a Republican. "They brought Cheney in, and that was a mistake." He cited "a disenchantment with the generic Republican label, which we always thought was the Good Housekeeping seal."

What's behind it? "American people just won't take a long war. Just – name me a war, even in a pro-military state like this. It's overall disappointment. It's national. No leadership, adrift. Things haven't worked." The future lies in rebuilding locally, not being "distracted" by Washington.

Is the Republican solid South over?

"Yeah. Oh yeah." He said, "I eat lunch every day at Buck's Cafe. Obama's picture is all over the wall."

How to come back? "The basic old conservative principles haven't changed. We got distracted by Washington, we got distracted from having good county organizations."

Should the party attempt to break with Mr. Bush? Mr. Reed said he supports the president. And then he said, simply, "We're past that."

We're past that time.

Mr. Reed said he was "short-term pessimistic, long-term optimistic." He has seen a lot of history. "After Goldwater in '64 we said, 'Let's get practical.' So we got ol' Dick. We got through Watergate. Been through a lot. We've had success a long time."

Throughout the interview this was a Reed refrain: "We got through that." We got through Watergate and Vietnam and changes large and small.

He was holding high the flag, but his refrain implicitly compared the current moment to disaster.

What happens to the Republicans in 2008 will likely be dictated by what didn't happen in 2005, and '06, and '07. The moment when the party could have broken, on principle, with the administration – over the thinking behind and the carrying out of the war, over immigration, spending and the size of government – has passed. What two years ago would have been honorable and wise will now look craven. They're stuck.

Mr. Bush has squandered the hard-built paternity of 40 years. But so has the party, and so have its leaders. If they had pushed away for serious reasons, they could have separated the party's fortunes from the president's. This would have left a painfully broken party, but they wouldn't be left with a ruined "brand," as they all say, speaking the language of marketing. And they speak that language because they are marketers, not thinkers. Not serious about policy. Not serious about ideas. And not serious about leadership, only followership.

This is and will be the great challenge for John McCain: The Democratic argument, now being market tested by Obama Inc., that a McCain victory will yield nothing more or less than George Bush's third term.

That is going to be powerful, and it is going to get out the vote. And not for Republicans.

Enough Already! - Shut Up and Suit Up

  Enough Already – Shut Up and Suit Up

By Chris Healy
Connecticut State Party Chairman

 
It is time for all Republican leaders, from Hartford to Sacramento, but especially Washington, D.C., to zip their lips, pull up their socks, grab your baseball bats and get back on the field of battle.
 
As a Northeastern Republican with solid conservative credentials, I believe the basic tenants of our party will resonant with the voters of this country. The problem is our own people in Congress and their hired hands on K Street, have not lived up to them over the past four years and learned nothing from 2006. Many our friends of mine but we locals need to intervene here and offer political quinine to Potomac fever.
 
We all get the joke out here on Main Street. For too long, Republicans in power have become accustomed to power and its trappings, its pork and living in a dream world where they think everyone agrees with them. The public and our base Republicans have grown angry and weary of this fact. Congress spent too much, grew the government to its greatest size ever and failed to produce the head of Osama Bin Laden.
 
The public expects Republicans to cut taxes and to win wars. We are the “grown’s party” for a reason. President Bush has not sold the war or the positive impact of his tax cuts on a daily basis and paid for it in the polls.
 
While Republicans agree with the surge and know the stakes for leaving, the voices against our policy are winning the public debate. The good news is the public is somewhat split on the options and they give Sen. McCain high marks for his positions on making sure we get the job done.
 
But, politics is an amorphous state of affairs and the party that is always breaking new ground and offering new ideas keeps its head above water.

Republicans used to be about that – welfare reform, entitlement reform school choice, NAFTA, you name it, we were the party that drove the agenda, saved Bill Clinton from himself and backed the Bush tax cuts that created seven years of growth.
 
Newt Gingrich is right – we are not offering hope and not being bold. We need to stop cowering in the corner and hiding under the kitchen table. We are going to win this Presidential campaign with John McCain as our nominee and we better start getting used to fact that Sen. McCain is the best possible candidate we can have at this moment in time.
 
First, McCain has been on the right side of the issues of spending reform and an end to the pork that Republicans have grown accustomed to. He is against the current Farm Bill, which is a sop to agribusiness that don’t need more subsidies while adding more in long-term spending. His position on keeping our nation safe is without peer and McCain and Gingrich know we must educate the public of the growing danger of nuclear terrorism against a major city.
 
Voters hold their Presidential vote closely. They don’t give it away. Barack Obama will be exposed as a left-wing, lightweight poser in time. McCain embodies what we want in a leader, tough, experienced, not afraid to break some China, but able to work with others to get things done. McCain has worked with people he doesn’t agree with, something Obama has never accomplished - much to the consternation of some conservative purists. It’s time for them “to grow up,” as Barry Goldwater said once, and put their shoulders to wheel for John McCain.
 
As for Congress, stand up and be counted. Stop using Washington-speak, Start talking to local reporters and stop playing into the NY-DC media maze. Lose the professional talks heads we send to MSNBC and CNN and put state chairmen and local party officials on national TV to explain how the Democrats are ruining our economy and how it affects every day people. Localize each Congressional election on what that candidate or incumbent can do for them and what Obama and a Democratic Congress will mean to every taxpayers in dollars and cents.
 
Stop voting for stupid spending bills like the Farm Bill. When a mega-liberal like Rosa DeLauro, D-CT,  calls passage of the Farm Bill, “sweet” every Republican who voted for that legislation should be ashamed of themselves.
 
Start voting as a team and keep tying the Democrats up. The Democrats will eventually turn on each other. And get out of Washington now and start meeting with voters and explaining what the Republican Party is and will be – like we are the only party that will kill the bad guys overseas that can wipe out a city with a briefcase; we are the only party that will allow children to be educated based on what parent and teachers want, not bureaucrats and that we are the only party that will not let the government take more of your salary or your pension.
 
But most importantly, talk to people like you need them rather than they need you. Tell them what Republicans are going to do to offer hope on the economy and confidence on security. Make it real and appeal to the American trait of what can be done, not what can’t be.
 
Take no quarter. Admit we lost our way, but that we got the message and have a plan and the alternative would be devastating for national security and economic prosperity.
 
Fight, or die!


All the best,


Christopher Healy

Newt's Plea to Republican Candidates

My Plea to Republicans: It's Time for Real Change to Avoid Real Disaster
by Newt Gingrich (more by this author)
Posted 05/06/2008 ET
Updated 05/06/2008 ET

The Republican loss in the special election for Louisiana's Sixth Congressional District last Saturday should be a sharp wake up call for Republicans: Either Congressional Republicans are going to chart a bold course of real change or they are going to suffer decisive losses this November.

The facts are clear and compelling.

Saturday's loss was in a district that President Bush carried by 19 percentage points in 2004 and that the Republicans have held since 1975.

This defeat follows on the loss of Speaker Hastert's seat in Illinois. That seat had been held by a Republican for 76 years with the single exception of the 1974 Watergate election when the Democrats held it for one term. That same seat had been carried by President Bush 55-44% in 2004.

Two GOP Losses That Validate a National Pattern

These two special elections validate a national polling pattern that is bad news for Republicans. According to a New York Times/CBS Poll, Americans disapprove of the President's job performance by 63 to 28 (and he has been below 40% job approval since December 2006, the longest such period for any president in the history of polling).

A separate New York Times/CBS Poll shows that a full 81 percent of Americans believe the economy is on the wrong track.

The current generic ballot for Congress according to the NY Times/CBS poll is 50 to 32 in favor of the Democrats. That is an 18-point margin, reminiscent of the depths of the Watergate disaster.

Congressional Republicans Can't Take Comfort in McCain's Poll Numbers

Senator McCain is currently running ahead of the Republican congressional ballot by about 16 percentage points. But there are two reasons that this extraordinary personal achievement should not comfort congressional Republicans.

First, McCain's lead is a sign of the gap between the McCain brand of independence and the GOP brand. No regular Republican would be tying or slightly beating the Democratic candidates in this atmosphere. It is a sign of how much McCain is a non-traditional Republican that he is sustaining his personal popularity despite his party's collapse.

Second, there is a grave danger for the McCain campaign that if the generic ballot stays at only 32 % for the GOP it will ultimately outweigh McCain's personal appeal and drag his candidacy into defeat.

The Anti-Obama, Anti-Wright, and Anti-Clinton GOP Model Has Been Tested -- And It Failed

The Republican brand has been so badly damaged that if Republicans try to run an anti-Obama, anti- Reverend Wright, or (if Senator Clinton wins), anti-Clinton campaign, they are simply going to fail.

This model has already been tested with disastrous results.

In 2006, there were six incumbent Republican Senators who had plenty of money, the advantage of incumbency, and traditionally successful consultants.

But the voters in all six states had adopted a simple position: "Not you." No matter what the GOP Senators attacked their opponents with, the voters shrugged off the attacks and returned to, "Not you."

The danger for House and Senate Republicans in 2008 is that the voters will say, "Not the Republicans."

Republicans Have Lost the Advantage on Every Single-Issue Poll

A February Washington Post poll shows that Republicans have lost the advantage to the Democrats on which party can handle an issue better -- on every single topic.

Americans now believe that Democrats can handle the deficit better (52 to 31), taxes better (48 to 40) and even terrorism better (44 to 37).

This is a catastrophic collapse of trust in Republicans built up over three generations on the deficit, two generations on taxes, and two generations on national security.

House Republicans Should Call an Emergency, Members-Only Conference

Faced with these election results, the House Republicans should hold an emergency members-only meeting. At the meeting, they should pose this stark choice: Real change or certain defeat.

If a majority of the House Republicans vote for real change, they should instruct Republican Leader John Boehner and his team to come back with a new plan by the Wednesday before the Memorial Day recess. This plan should involve real change in legislative, communications, and campaign strategy and involve immediate, real action, including a complete overhaul of the Congressional Campaign Committee. The House Republican Conference would then vote for the plan or insist on its revision.

If a majority of the House Republicans are opposed to acting then the minority who are activists should establish a parallel organization dedicated to real change. This group should focus its energies on creating the changes necessary to survive despite a conference with a minority mindset that accepts defeat rather than fights for real change (which is what we had when I entered Congress in 1978).

Nine Acts of Real Change That Could Restore the GOP Brand

Here are nine acts of real change that would begin to rebuild the American people's confidence that Republicans share their values, understand their worries, and are prepared to act instead of just talk. The Republicans in Congress could get a start on all nine this week if they had the will to do so.

Repeal the gas tax for the summer, and pay for the repeal by cutting domestic discretionary spending so that the transportation infrastructure trust fund would not be hurt. At a time when, according to The Hill newspaper, Senator Clinton is asking for $2.3billion in earmarks, it should be possible for Republicans to establish a "government spending versus your pocketbook" fight over cutting the gas tax that would resonate with most Americans. Lower taxes and less government spending should be a battle cry most taxpayers and all conservatives could rally behind.

Redirect the oil being put into the national petroleum reserve onto the open market. That oil would lower the price of gasoline an extra 5 to 6 cents per gallon, and its sale would lower the deficit.

Introduce a "more energy at lower cost with less environmental damage and greater national security bill" as a replacement for the Warner-Lieberman "tax and trade" bill which is coming to the floor of the Senate in the next few weeks (see my newsletter next week for an outline of a solid pro-economy, pro-national security, pro-environment energy bill). When the American people realize how much the current energy prices are actually a "politicians' energy crisis" they will demand real change in our policies.

Establish an earmark moratorium for one year and pledge to uphold the presidential veto of bills with earmarks through the end of 2009. The American people are fed up with politicians spending their money. They currently believe both parties are equally bad. This is a real opportunity to show the difference.

Overhaul the census and cut its budget radically. The recent announcement that the Census Bureau could not build an effective hand-held computer for $1.3 billion and is turning instead to 600,000 temporary workers to do a paper and pencil census in 2010 is an opportunity to slash its budget, shrink its bureaucracy, and turn to entrepreneurial internet-based companies to build an information-age census. This is an absurdity that cries out for bold, decisive reform (see my YouTube video "FedEx versus federal bureaucracy" for an example of what I mean).

Implement a space-based, GPS-style air traffic control system. The problems of the Federal Aviation Administration are symptoms of a union-dominated bureaucracy resisting change. If we implemented a space-based GPS-style air traffic system we would get 40% more air travel with one-half the bureaucrats. The union has stopped 200,000,000 passengers from enjoying more reliable air travel to protect 7,000 obsolete jobs. This real change would allow the millions of frustrated travelers to have champions in congress trying to help them get places better, safer, faster.

Declare English the official language of government. This real change is supported by 87% of the American people including a majority of Democrats, Republicans, Independents, and Latinos. It is an issue of national unity that brings Americans together in a red, white, and blue majority.

Protect the workers' right to a secret ballot. The vast majority (around 81%) of Americans believe that American workers have a right to have a secret ballot election before they are forced to join a union. Last year the House Democrats passed a bill that would strip American workers of the secret ballot. A new bill should be introduced reaffirming that right, and it should be brought up again and again until marginal Democrats are forced to vote with the American people against the union power structure.

Remind Americans that judges matter. Senate Republicans should mount an ongoing fight (including a filibuster of other activities if necessary) to get the American people to realize that liberals want to block all current judicial appointments in order to maximize the number of left wing radical judges they can appoint if they win the White House. This issue has three advantages. It reminds people that judges matter and that a leftwing radical Supreme Court would be bad for the values of most (70 to 90 percent, depending on the issue) Americans. It shows the Democrats are not engaged in fair play. It arouses the activism of those who have been disappointed by Republicans and have forgotten how bad a liberal Democratic Presidency would be.
What Is at Stake

No Republicans should kid themselves. It's time to face up to a stark choice.

Without change we could face a catastrophic election this fall.

Without change the Republican Party in the House could revert to the permanent minority status it had from 1930 to 1994.

Without change, the majorities of Americans who support the Republican principle of smaller, more efficient, smarter and fairer government will be in for a rude awakening.

It's time for real change to avoid a real disaster.

The "May Day Massacre": Can Liberals Govern in a Global Economy?

Despite the poor outlook for conservatives in our elections this November, there is encouraging news from across the Atlantic. The conservative wave sweeping Europe hit England last week when the liberal Labor Party suffered its worst local election results in 40 years.

Boris Johnson became the first Conservative Party member elected mayor of London when he defeated Labour candidate "Red" Ken Livingstone. In contests for more than 4,000 local seats across England, Conservatives captured 44 percent of the vote, compared to 25 percent for the Liberal Democrats and just 24 percent for Labour.

This Conservative victory in England comes on the heels of a history-making rout of the Communists and the Greens in parliamentary elections Italy two weeks ago. And the Italian results follow center-right victories in France (Sarkozy) and Germany (Merkel). The countries of so-called "old" Europe are turning away from the liberal high tax, big government policies that have crippled their economies and are turning toward pro-growth, pro-competitive center-right solutions.

All of which raises the question: Can the Left successfully govern in a modern, global economy? The voters of Europe seem to be saying no.

Your friend,

Newt Gingrich

Liberal Roadmap to Crush Conservatism

Wishing you a happy "Tax Day"

To all my tax and spend Democrat friends here in Michigan, we wish you happy Tax Day. It's a great reminder to all of us, especially the taxpayers, of how much it costs us to vote for Democrats.

Under Governor Granholm and the Democrat led legislature...

...TAXES have gone up,

...SPENDING has gone up,

...PERKS have gone up,

...and the Governor has seen much of the world at taxpayers expense!

HAPPY TAX DAY...and thank you NOT so very much Michigan Democrats.

In the words of Ronald Reagan:

"Republicans Believe Every Day Is The Fourth Of July,
But Democrats Believe Every Day Is April 15."

Powerful Commentary

“I may well have spent more time embedded with combat units in Iraq than any other journalist alive. I have seen this war – and our part in it – at its brutal worst. And I say the transformation over the last 14 months is little short of miraculous.”

Wall Street Journal

April 11, 2008

OPINION

Let's 'Surge' Some More
By MICHAEL YON
April 11, 2008; Page A17

It is said that generals always fight the last war. But when David Petraeus came to town it was senators – on both sides of the aisle – who battled over the Iraq war of 2004-2006. That war has little in common with the war we are fighting today.

I may well have spent more time embedded with combat units in Iraq than any other journalist alive. I have seen this war – and our part in it – at its brutal worst. And I say the transformation over the last 14 months is little short of miraculous.

The change goes far beyond the statistical decline in casualties or incidents of violence. A young Iraqi translator, wounded in battle and fearing death, asked an American commander to bury his heart in America. Iraqi special forces units took to the streets to track down terrorists who killed American soldiers. The U.S. military is the most respected institution in Iraq, and many Iraqi boys dream of becoming American soldiers. Yes, young Iraqi boys know about "GoArmy.com."

As the outrages of Abu Ghraib faded in memory – and paled in comparison to al Qaeda's brutalities – and our soldiers under the Petraeus strategy got off their big bases and out of their tanks and deeper into the neighborhoods, American values began to win the war.

Iraqis came to respect American soldiers as warriors who would protect them from terror gangs. But Iraqis also discovered that these great warriors are even happier helping rebuild a clinic, school or a neighborhood. They learned that the American soldier is not only the most dangerous enemy in the world, but one of the best friends a neighborhood can have.

Some people charge that we have merely "rented" the Sunni tribesmen, the former insurgents who now fight by our side. This implies that because we pay these people, their loyalty must be for sale to the highest bidder. But as Gen. Petraeus demonstrated in Nineveh province in 2003 to 2004, many of the Iraqis who filled the ranks of the Sunni insurgency from 2003 into 2007 could have been working with us all along, had we treated them intelligently and respectfully. In Nineveh in 2003, under then Maj. Gen. Petraeus's leadership, these men – many of them veterans of the Iraqi army – played a crucial role in restoring civil order. Yet due to excessive de-Baathification and the administration's attempt to marginalize powerful tribal sheiks in Anbar and other provinces – including men even Saddam dared not ignore – we transformed potential partners into dreaded enemies in less than a year.

Then al Qaeda in Iraq, which helped fund and tried to control the Sunni insurgency for its own ends, raped too many women and boys, cut off too many heads, and brought drugs into too many neighborhoods. By outraging the tribes, it gave birth to the Sunni "awakening." We – and Iraq – got a second chance. Powerful tribes in Anbar province cooperate with us now because they came to see al Qaeda for what it is – and to see Americans for what we truly are.

Soldiers everywhere are paid, and good generals know it is dangerous to mess with a soldier's money. The shoeless heroes who froze at Valley Forge were paid, and when their pay did not come they threatened to leave – and some did. Soldiers have families and will not fight for a nation that allows their families to starve. But to say that the tribes who fight with us are "rented" is perhaps as vile a slander as to say that George Washington's men would have left him if the British offered a better deal.

Equally misguided were some senators' attempts to use Gen. Petraeus's statement, that there could be no purely military solution in Iraq, to dismiss our soldiers' achievements as "merely" military. In a successful counterinsurgency it is impossible to separate military and political success. The Sunni "awakening" was not primarily a military event any more than it was "bribery." It was a political event with enormous military benefits.

The huge drop in roadside bombings is also a political success – because the bombings were political events. It is not possible to bury a tank-busting 1,500-pound bomb in a neighborhood street without the neighbors noticing. Since the military cannot watch every road during every hour of the day (that would be a purely military solution), whether the bomb kills soldiers depends on whether the neighbors warn the soldiers or cover for the terrorists. Once they mostly stood silent; today they tend to pick up their cell phones and call the Americans. Even in big "kinetic" military operations like the taking of Baqubah in June 2007, politics was crucial. Casualties were a fraction of what we expected because, block-by-block, the citizens told our guys where to find the bad guys. I was there; I saw it.

The Iraqi central government is unsatisfactory at best. But the grass-roots political progress of the past year has been extraordinary – and is directly measurable in the drop in casualties.

This leads us to the most out-of-date aspect of the Senate debate: the argument about the pace of troop withdrawals. Precisely because we have made so much political progress in the past year, rather than talking about force reduction, Congress should be figuring ways and means to increase troop levels. For all our successes, we still do not have enough troops. This makes the fight longer and more lethal for the troops who are fighting. To give one example, I just returned this week from Nineveh province, where I have spent probably eight months between 2005 to 2008, and it is clear that we remain stretched very thin from the Syrian border and through Mosul. Vast swaths of Nineveh are patrolled mostly by occasional overflights.

We know now that we can pull off a successful counterinsurgency in Iraq. We know that we are working with an increasingly willing citizenry. But counterinsurgency, like community policing, requires lots of boots on the ground. You can't do it from inside a jet or a tank.

Over the past 15 months, we have proved that we can win this war. We stand now at the moment of truth. Victory – and a democracy in the Arab world – is within our grasp. But it could yet slip away if our leaders remain transfixed by the war we almost lost, rather than focusing on the war we are winning today.

Mr. Yon is author of the just-published "Moment of Truth in Iraq" (Richard Vigilante Books). He has been reporting from Iraq and Afghanistan since December 2004.

See all of today's editorials and op-eds, plus video commentary, on Opinion Journal1.

And add your comments to the Opinion Journal forum2.

URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120787343563306609.html

Tax Freedom Day....how long must we work to pay?

http://www.taxfoundation.org/taxfreedomday/

Happy Easter!!!

Traditional Lithuanian Easter Eggs

Sweet Home Alabama...Reagan's smiling!

Back in the days of the Soviet Union, the Soviet Red Army had an official choir composed of male soldiers and musicians.  It still exists.  The Red Army Choir performs throughout Russia to this day.

Now consider the Finnish rock band called The Leningrad Cowboys.  They held a concert in Russia, in which - to the screaming applause of Russkie teen-agers - they got the Red Army Choir to join them on stage for a performance of "Sweet Home Alabama."

Reagan responds to Obama and/or Clinton

Now...more than ever!!!

Reform state, don't pretend and spend

Thursday, March 6, 2008

Opinion

Reform state, don't pretend and spend

Declining revenue requires lawmakers to make bold fixes in government costs

Tom Watkins

Happy days are here again in Lansing. There seems to be a can't-we-all-just-get-along? refrain coming from both sides of the political aisle. This attitude adjustment is an improvement after the fiasco of 2007, when partisan bickering made Michigan look like a circus on steroids.

Gov. Jennifer Granhom has received accolades as she called for investment in more State Police troopers, K-12 education, community colleges and our state universities -- all with no new taxes or increased fees. While solid proposals, the question remains: Are they realistic?

They weren't during the 2006 gubernatorial election. There were calls for these same investments and, lo and behold, after the election, the state had a $1 billion deficit. And three departments over-spent their allotted budgets by $69 million.

But as the economy melts down, both sides of the political aisle seem content to play election-year economic make-believe about making tough choices about the state budget.

The outlook for state revenue may not be as good as state officials initially assumed. Prices of homes are plummeting as a result of the high foreclosure rate, causing local taxes collected by counties, municipalities and community colleges to plunge.

Auto sales are down. The national unemployment rate has jumped from 4.7 percent to 5 percent. Michigan's national-worst jobless rate is 7.6 percent.

The state treasurer and heads of the state House and Senate fiscal agencies have reduced their revenue estimates made last May by about $370 million for the current fiscal year, according to the Associated Press. January revenue came in about $40 million lower than expected after it was higher than expected in the two prior months.

The governor and Legislature increased taxes in 2007, dodging the tough, bold structural changes called for by the bipartisan Emergency Financial Advisory Panel. Following the panel's recommendations would have positioned our state for the new realities of a global economy.

Michigan may well be going on a spend-and-pretend spree when it should be on a reform-and-transform campaign.

Here are three reforms the Legislature should make now:

• Consolidations and agreements to share services could save millions of dollars. Michigan has 83 counties, more than 1,200 townships, nearly 500 cities and villages with less than 10,000 residents, more than 550 public school districts, hundreds of charter schools and 57 intermediate school districts. Eliminate the duplicated bureaucracy. Tie future state aid to demonstrating significant savings at all levels of government.

• Michigan is one of four states that spends more on prisons than on higher education. It has the highest incarceration rate of the Great Lake states. While our crime rate has declined since 1981, our prison population has soared. Contract out portions of the correction system and find other efficiencies while addressing sentencing guidelines that are doing nothing to keep us safe.

• More action is needed in the pensions and health care of educators and other public employees. The fixes to date are anemic. Changes can be made without unfairly burdening employees. Proposed spending increases for K-12 education will not cover rising pension, health care and other legacy costs.

The only thing worse than not investing in things that will help make us stronger is continuing to pretend we are -- only to pull the rug from under our schools, colleges, universities, cities and families when the economic fairy tale turns out to be make-believe.

We will spend the election-year money. But will state government make the changes to ensure the bills really will be covered?

Tom Watkins is an education and business consultant who was state superintendent of public instruction from 2001-2005 and state mental health director in 1986-1990. E-mail: letters@detnews.com.

http://www.detnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080306/OPINION01/803060317/1007/OPINION

R.I.P. William F. Buckley Jr.

Anuzis' Statement on the passing of William F. Buckley, Jr.

“God saw all that he had made, and it was very good,” mankind is
told at the end of the first chapter of the Book of Genesis.  There is no
doubt in my mind that on a beautiful day in 1925 God went back to work and
with His best effort made William F. Buckley, Jr.  Now, God welcomes His
very good creation back after an incredible life in which Buckley helped to
create the modern conservative movement. 

“At the Michigan Republican Party, I know I express the feelings of
thousands of grassroots members who are saddened at the passing of a man
whose intellect and ability to communicate basic conservative ideas and
values changed our state, nation and world.  Buckley practiced his
conservatism with élan and style.  When I was a young conservative in
college, watching Firing Line and reading National Review, I thought Buckley made conservatism cool.  Later, conservative lions like Bill Buckley and Russell Kirk inspired Governor Engler to lead a conservative renaissance in Michigan in the 1990s.

“I am told that Bill Buckley died at his desk, still at work in his
study.  We can only imagine his last thoughts and wishes, but I think we can
all honor his memory and build his legacy by working even harder to rebuild
the conservative movement.  More than anything, Buckley understood the power of ideas, and now it is our job to keep up the fight to make elections aboutideas and substance, not about rhetoric and personality. 

“Friends and admirers throughout Michigan extend their condolences
to his son Christopher and the entire Buckley family.  Be assured that
you are in our prayers.”

Congressman Hoekstra in National Review

The original article in National Review can be seen here: http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=YjQ4MTZiM2E0NmExYmNiZGM4ZTA2YWZiYmVmNDc2NDc

February 25, 2008, 4:00 a.m.

Another Vacation from History
The House fails to protect America.

By Peter Hoekstra

Over a week ago, the Democrat-controlled U.S. House of Representatives left town for a ten-day recess without taking action on a vital, bipartisan bill to fix the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). A temporary fix to FISA, the Protect America Act, expired midnight, February 17 — the act allowed intelligence agencies to monitor suspected foreign terrorists’ electronic communications, on foreign soil, without time-consuming court orders.

The corresponding Senate bill passed by a vote of 68-29 and, with 21 Democrats pledging their support, the House bill would easily have passed if Speaker Pelosi permitted it to be brought to a vote. This inaction represents more than just unprecedented irresponsibility by the House leadership — it indicates House Democrats are taking a vacation from history.

Democrats claim that authorities provided under the Protect America Act, even though the act is expired, will allow the government to continue to monitor known foreign terrorists, without bureaucratic obstacles, for up to a year. This is misleading — those authorities will not cover many potential threats, especially new ones. With the Protect America Act expired, detecting and neutralizing many threats will now require burdensome paperwork, government lawyers, and court orders. This bureaucracy will cost precious time, time that could mean the difference in stopping a terrorist plot or saving the life of an American soldier.

Another key part of the bill the Senate passed provided immunity from lawsuits to private companies that allegedly assisted U.S. intelligence agencies in monitoring suspected terrorists’ communications. At the time, the government assured the companies the monitoring was legal, but trial attorneys are suing for billions of dollars — and have contributed more $1.5 million to Democrat coffers.

Without protection from the lawsuits, these companies obviously will be reluctant to cooperate with the government in the future. A similar signal will be sent to intelligence officers on the front lines of the battle with al-Qaeda, many of whom have been forced to take out professional liability insurance to protect them from the actions of the Democratic Congress.
This fits into a broader trend of Democrats’ behavior over the last two decades. “A vacation from history” is a phrase many conservatives have used to describe the national-security policies of the Clinton administration, which operated on the faulty premise that the end of the Cold War meant the end of serious threats to our nation.

As a result, CIA funding and personnel were slashed drastically, putting the agency into what then-director George Tenet claimed was “Chapter 11” by 1997. The CIA downgraded its analysis of terrorism in the 1990s, but it did find the money and personnel for politically correct intelligence efforts such as a “DCI Environmental Center,” which used spy satellites to monitor volcanoes and sea-turtle nests.

The current House leadership has dismissed Republican concerns about the ongoing global threat from radical Jihadists and the need to give U.S. intelligence agencies the tools they need to combat this threat — they accuse Republicans of “fear mongering.” By doing so, the House leadership has chosen to ignore not just the catastrophic post-9/11 attacks in London, Madrid, and Bali, or the two dozen terrorist plots against the United States foiled since 2001, but also more recent history, such as the December 2007 assassination of Benazir Bhutto and al-Qaeda activity over the last six months in Denmark, Germany, and Algeria.

Meanwhile, politically correct intelligence hasn’t died — in the 2008 Intelligence Authorization bill, House and Senate Democrats directed U.S. intelligence agencies to draft a National Intelligence Assessment on global climate change. House Intelligence Committee staff recently visited CIA for talks on how the agency is analyzing global warming.

There is no greater responsibility for U.S. elected officials than to protect the American people. Leaving for a ten-day vacation without fixing FISA first gambles with our national security. When the House reconvenes this week, our top priority should be passing the Senate FISA bill. History never takes a vacation. Neither do terrorists.

— Congressman Pete Hoekstra is the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee and represents Michigan’s second congressional district.

A Simple Economics Lesson...from a wise, old friend

Bar Stool Economics

Suppose, that every day, ten men go out for beer and the bill for all ten comes to $100.  If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:

The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.
The fifth would pay $1.
The sixth would pay $3.
The seventh would pay $7.
The eighth would pay $12.
The ninth would pay $18.
The tenth man (the richest) would pay $59.

So, that's what they decided to do. The ten men drank in the bar every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement, until one day, the owner threw them a curve.   'Since you are all such good customers, he said, 'I'm going to reduce the cost of your daily beer by $20. Drinks for the ten now cost just $80.

The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes so the first four men were unaffected.  They would still drink for free. But what about the other six men - the paying customers?  How could they divide the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his 'fair share?' They realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody's share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would each end up being paid to drink his beer.  So, the bar owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.

And so:
The fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (100% savings).
The sixth now paid $2 instead of $3 (33% savings).
The seventh now pay $5 instead of $7 (28% savings).
The eighth now paid $9 instead of $12 (25% savings).
The ninth now paid $14 instead of $18 (22% savings).
The tenth now paid $49 instead of $59 (16% savings).

Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to drink for free. But once outside the restaurant the men began to compare their savings.   

'I only got a dollar out of the $20,' declared the sixth man. He pointed to the tenth man,' but he got $10!'

'Yeah, that's right,' exclaimed the fifth man. 'I only saved a dollar, too. It's unfair that he got ten times more than I!'

'That's true!!' shouted the seventh man. 'Why should he get $10 back when I got only two? The wealthy get all the breaks!'

'Wait a minute,' yelled the first four men in unison. 'We didn't get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!'

The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up.

The next night the tenth man didn't show up for drinks, so the nine sat down and had beers without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something important. They didn't have enough money between all of them for even half of the bill!

And that, boys and girls, journalists and college professors, is how our tax system works.  The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction.  Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up anymore. In fact, they might start drinking overseas where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier.

For those who understand, no explanation is needed.
For those who do not understand, no explanation is possible.

David R. Kamerschen, Ph.D.
Professor of Economics, University of Georgia

Michael Zak's Birthday with to the RNC

Grand Old Partisan salutes the Republican National Committee, established on this day in 1856 to coordinate nationwide opposition to the pro-slavery policies of the Democrats.

Republicans from many state parties held their first national organizational meeting in Pittsburgh on February 22, 1856. Presiding over this preliminary session was former U.S. Senator Lawrence Brainerd (VT), a resolute anti-slavery activist.

The next day, delegates chose the first Republican National Committee. New York's Republican state Chairman, Edwin Morgan, was then elected the first Chairman of the RNC. He had the immense responsibility of organizing the first Republican National Convention, to be held just four months later in Philadelphia. Morgan would be elected Governor of New York and U.S. Senator.

So, today is the 152nd anniversary of the RNC. Two years ago, it would have been a phenomenal opportunity for the Republican National Committee to celebrate its 150th anniversary, to kick off the mid-term election campaign season on a unifying and positive note. Alas, this magnificent party-building and fundraising and outreach opportunity just slipped away! Nonetheless, today we honor -- or should honor -- the patriots, the heroes, the visionaries who gave us our Grand Old Party.

Republicans today would benefit tremendously from appreciating the true heritage of our Grand Old Party.

This Republican heritage article is available on the Grand Old Partisan blog -- http://grandoldpartisan.typepad.com -- each day celebrating 154 years of Republican heroes and heroics.

Castro's Cuba...Fidel's Shoes???

Congressman McCotter on Lou Dobbs

Anuzis Visits Jackson Dems with MRP Taxpayers Check

Anuzis stops in Jackson outside the county's Democratic Party Headquarters with the Michigan Republican Party's Taxpayers Check to remind voters in this crucial swing area that Democrats stand for bigger government and higher taxes.

Merry Christmas...and enjoy the holidays!

There will be NO more regular Articles of Interest until after the New Years. 

May you have a joyous and blessed holiday season.

Merry Christmas!