Now Is Not The Time For New Laws

Reposted as history. Originally posted in March of 2005.


Opinion - "Life and justice"
By Stephanie Duffey - Roanoke-Chowan News-Herald

In light of the recent Supreme Court decision to reject yet another appeal from Terri Schiavo's parents to have their brain damaged daughter's feeding tube reinserted, the future of disabled Americans looks anything but bleak. ..............

Just as the Lawrence v. Texas ruling that overturned the illegality of sodomy set the stage for arguments favoring homosexual marriage in Massachusetts, so too could the rulings from the Schiavo case set a precedent for the treatment of those with disabilities.

Stephanie Duffey thinks this case will create the political passion to pass laws that she obviously favors. I wonder if she realizes how little concern for Terri she seems to have.

There is no question that this case has aroused heated passions. The issues of life and death always do. Parental and family love versus marriage "rights" is an issue that creates anger, especially with the court's fondness for simple black and white "rights". Just look at how they strip grandparents of visitation with their grandchildren when a custodial parent who dislikes their stepparents keeps their grandchildren from them. In this case a simplistic "right" of a husband to decide medical care for his spouse has been challenged by parents who have spewed such venom at the husband, and hurled so many as yet unproven charges, that the husband has retreated into a stubborn determination to deny them the ability to save their daughter.

Whether you believe that she is still alive or not no longer seems to be the issue. Everyone is more concerned with having their view of the right outcome jammed down everyone else's throats. Women rights advocates have jumped in over hatred of the concept that a husband should make this call. Right to life advocates have equated this to the right of an unborn child to live. Right to death advocates ignore that the decision is not being made by a sentient person and support the courts in their desire to see a new right to death created.

With all of this irrelevant side baggage and with the lack of any ability of our courts to solve complex matters, who thinks that a war to create new laws will accomplish anything productive? Laws passed in heat rarely are good laws. Is this really just about finding an issue that can create political heat and thus political contributions?

That is where we are headed. Poor Terri Schiavo. She has become a symbol for a lot of people who care only about their own opinion ....... and little for her. That will be Terri's legacy no matter what happens.

Christopher Hitchens On The Media Coverage Of Iraq

[scroll down on hyperlink to find section quoted]

Hugh Hewitt - Wednesday March 22nd, 2006 - Radio Blogger

Hugh Hewitt (HH): Christopher Hitchens, just objectively stepping back, is Iraq better off today than it was four years ago, given the documents we are now seeing, given what Robert Kaplan called the unbelievably Stalinist nature of Hussein's regime, and the mad as hatter sons who were in line and would never have given it up.

Christopher Hitchens (CH): Yes.

HH: What do you think?

CH: Oh, on that decision, there's only one way to argue it. It's not only a great deal better off than it was four years ago, but it's enormously better off than it would have been if it had been left to rot and crash under this mad despotism, which bear in mind, stayed in power by using the tactics of divided rule, and importing jihadists like Zarqawi, and the Fedayeen Saddam, who were going to be the suppressor regime. I mean, if you think it's bad now, just try and imagine what it would have been like if it had been left alone. And on that, I don't think there's any dispute at all. And by the way, I've made this point in countless arguments with so-called anti-war people, many of whom are actually pro-war, but on the other side, in public and in print and on television and on radio and in universities. I've never had any of them reply to my point there.

HH: When you say pro-war but on the other side, what do you mean, Christopher Hitchens?

CH: Well, I object to people like Michael Moore for example, or Ramsey Clark being referred to as...in the New York Times as anti-war activists, or anti-war campaigners. They're not anti-war at all. For one thing, they're not pacifists, particularly not Ramsey Clark. For another, they've declared that they believe the beheaders and jihadists and the blowers up of Mosques and mutilators of women and so forth are a liberation force or an insurgency. Michael Moore even said they were the modern equivalent to the American founding fathers. So in that case, fine. George Galloway's the same. Many of them are. They're not really against the war. They're not anti-war, but on the other side in the war for civilization, and they should be called out on it and given their right name.

I have recently been called a "right wing wacko" for expressing the very same view, expressed eloquently above by Christopher Hitchens, noted liberal and marxist. (Can a liberal and marxist be a right wing wacko?)

Hitchens and I do not agree on everything, but Hitchens has one characteristic that makes him one of my favorite writers. He will tell you WHY he believes the things he believes. He argues his case. I believe that if more people who oppose the war were required to explain themselves rather than just throw insults, the public dialog on the war against islamofascism would be more usefull. Our main stream media has totally disserved the nation by blatantly taking sides on this issue and failing miserably to provide a forum for intelligent discussion.

Why Democrats Are Irrelevant

There is a common thread through most of the intellectual discussions and writings going on in America today. Democrats are irrelevant in any way but their political power to obstruct. Start with the current discussion of the American courts and their role in society. The book "Men in Black: How the Supreme Court is Destroying America," by Mark R. Levin is a nationwide bestseller. In the past best selling books have always been lauded by democrats as proof that their ideas were superior. However that was back when their books with liberal themes were the best sellers.

In Charles Lane's review "Conservative's Book on Supreme Court Is a Bestseller", Lane quotes a leading liberal lawyer Mark Tushnet on Levin's book. "Tushnet said he has not read Men in Black and does not know anyone who has". This is not surprising, because democrats are proponents of the concept of "political correctness", the doctrine which says you cannot even acknowledge or discuss ideas that are not accepted as "liberal". Tushnet's own book on the courts has been reviewed on all the main stream media, while Levin's has been ignored. But Tushnet's book has sold minimal copies and Levin's is a best seller. However Tushnet won't read it. This says as much as anything about the growing irrelevance of democrats in America's intellectual discussions on governance.

The major intellectual discussion today is between conservatives and neo-conservatives, two factions in the Republican party. Patrick Buchanan, a conservative, has written an intriguing article on George Bush's shortcomings, and the shortcomings of the neo-conservative movement, entitled, "A Republic, Not a Democracy". Buchanan has some solid criticism of the risks of Bush's efforts in the middle east and the long term implications for his policies. This is an important dialog. However liberals are on the sidelines in this critical discussion, as "political correctness" dictates they cannot even argue the issues being discussed. Instead they simply decry that anyone would consider either position and condemn the discussion.

This obstructionist attitude is blatantly displayed in the democrat opposition to Paul Wolfowitz, one of the leading proponents of neo-conservative thought. Democrats simply attack Wolfowitz no matter what. The liberal position is noted in Stephen Hayes' article "Crying Wolfowitz". He quotes democrat Al Kamen.

On March 2, 2005, Al Kamen, who writes the scoop-heavy "Inside the Loop" column in the Washington Post, addressed the "rumors" and "news reports" that Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz would soon be put forward by George W. Bush as president of the World Bank. "No way that was going to happen," Kamen wrote. "(The notion was too much even for this column.)"

And yet, as Hayes noted, that is exactly what George Bush did two weeks later. What Hayes goes on to describe is the admiration and adolation that Wolfowitz is receiving from leading democracy advocates in the middle east.

According to several people at the service, a throng of Lebanese Christians (and some Muslims) gathered around Wolfowitz to thank him for pushing reform in the Middle East. The scene caused Farid Abboud, the Syrian-backed Lebanese ambassador to the United States, to mutter, "Who does he think he is, the patriarch?"

Wolfowitz advocates "the U.S. vision of liberal democracy and free-market economics tak(ing) root around the world." Liberal Joe Biden acknowledges that Wolfowitz is considered a leading intellectual on international affairs and is a "solid" individual. How can advocating our form of government not be something at least worth discussing? In the "politically correct" world of most democrats, this is unacceptable and must be obstructed.

The closest democrats come to being relevant in current discussions is when the issue of politics comes up. They are still master politicians. When the issue is political posturing, there are still relevant points to make. In John Leo's article in the liberal "U.S. News and World Report", "Double-standard trouble" the double standards of both democrats and conservatives are addressed. What is surprising is when the article makes the following point.

Justice Antonin Scalia, in his Roper dissent, tossed a grenade at the (liberal) American Psychological Association on grounds of double standards. In an abortion case before the Supreme Court in 1990, the APA said a "rich body of research" showed that by age 14 or 15 people are mature enough to choose abortion because they have "abilities similar to adults in reasoning about moral dilemmas." But the APA's certitude of the strong moral grasp of young teens apparently evaporated just in time for Roper, in which it told the court that minors just aren't mature enough to be eligible for the maximum penalty faced by adult killers.

I cannot remember when a MSM organization like the "U.S. News" would even acknowledge points that attacked a democrat position. In the past there would have been no balance in the article and it would have ended with an example of conservative inconsistency. However this article actually ends with criticism of the democrat position of attacking John Ashcroft while still embracing Castro, including acceptance of his incarceration of librarians in Cuba.

The (American) librarians' silence has to do with the lingering romantic attachment of the American left to communism in general and Fidel Castro in particular.

This silence is a perfect example of the "political correctness" doctrine. It is also an reminder that the "political correct" message is created by people who are America hating socialists. "Political correctness" has ended the democrats participation in the discussions that are important and thus made them irrelevant, by silencing them.

This may be the reason that Martin Peretz, editor of the major liberal magazine "The New Republic" wrote the following in his despairing editorial, "Losing our Delusions".

Ask yourself: Who is a truly influential liberal mind in our culture? Whose ideas challenge and whose ideals inspire? Whose books and articles are read and passed around? There's no one, really.

The intolerance of "political correctness" has reduced the democrats ability to participate in the nation's dialog so far that even democrats are starting to note the effect. Democrats are simply irrelevant in any important way to the intellectual discussions that are shaping our nation and our world.

In their attempt to silence their opponents, they have silenced their own supporters.

Split Panel Sends Renominated Candidate to Full Senate

Reposted as history. Originally posted in March of 2005.


Neil A. Lewis - March 18, 2005 - New York Times

WASHINGTON, DC - Voting along strict party lines, the Senate Judiciary Committee approved the first of President Bush's appeals court nominees on Thursday, hastening the Senate's march to a large-scale partisan breakdown.

Senator Arlen Specter, the Pennsylvania Republican who is the committee's chairman, urged the panel's Democrats not to waste time attacking the candidate, William G. Myers III. "We all know the outcome will be on party lines," Mr. Specter said.

And so it was, with all 10 Republicans on the committee voting to send the nomination to the floor and all 8 Democrats voting against that.

As usual the Times expounds on all the reasons that Bush's nominee is bad, and ignores the alternative reasons he is qualified. They also set up the hypothesis that the Republicans are considering compromise on the "nuclear option" fight, with the implication that they really ought to compromise if they are reasonable.

They should not. No judicial candidate has ever before been filibustered until the democrats started filibustering George Bush's nominees. The democrats have now done it to over 10 candidates (it is so many I have lost exact count). This unprecedented attack on the process of selecting judges must be ended. The current makeup of the courts is as biased towards one political agenda (liberal) as it has ever been. If the courts continue as a political entity, justice in our nation is finished. This is a most serious issue that must be won.

Freeze! I Just Had My Nails Done!

Reposted as history. Originally posted in March of 2005.


Ann Coulter - March 16, 2005 - anncoulter.com

How many people have to die before the country stops humoring feminists? Last week, a defendant in a rape case, Brian Nichols, wrested a gun from a female deputy in an Atlanta courthouse and went on a murderous rampage. Liberals have proffered every possible explanation for this breakdown in security except the giant elephant in the room — who undoubtedly has an eating disorder and would appreciate a little support vis-a-vis her negative body image.

Ann, as usual has a completely different take on another public issue. As usual her position is feisty and attacking. But also, and as usual, it is funny. (I guess that would be, funny unless you are one of the feminists she is attacking!)

Money Mad

Reposted as history. Originally posted in March of 2005.


Jacob Sullum - March 11, 2005 - TownHall.com

In 1991, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., was reprimanded by the Senate Ethics Committee for his "poor judgment" in meeting with federal bank regulators who were investigating Arizona businessman Charles Keating, one of his campaign contributors. Ever since then, McCain has been trying to show he is not a hack politician kowtowing to special interests but a man of integrity and principle.

Yet the main principle served by McCain's crusade for campaign finance "reform" has been the principle of incumbent protection, the same goal that motivates hack politicians who kowtow to special interests. In the end, it's hard to see how McCain's crusade to remove the corrupting influence of money from politics is any more admirable than the corruption of which he was suspected in the Keating scandal.

I certainly agree with the last statement above ..... actually I agree pretty much with the entire article. John McCain is a good man who has rationalized supporting some of the most corrupt legislation that has ever been passed. It's clear his actions have harmed free speech. McCain-Feingold has allowed for government bureaucrats to have power over individual citizens that should never be allowed.

Why McCain cannot see the evil he has inflicted is not clear, but then George W. Bush seems to have a similar unwillingness to accept that his support for illegal immigration is not in our country's interest either. I suppose everyone has a blind spot somewhere and I am not excluded. I still feel that McCain's support for unconstitutional legislation that harms our country makes him unfit to be President, a position he clearly wants badly.

Thou Shalt Not Create

Reposted as history. Originally posted in March of 2005.


By Charles Krauthammer - Friday, March 11, 2005 - Washington Post

You do not create a human embryo to be a means to some other end. Most people with a moral sense ........... understand immediately that there is something fundamentally different, fundamentally corrupting, fundamentally dangerous about allowing -- indeed, encouraging -- the manufacture of human embryos for the purpose of their dissection and use for parts.

Do you agree with this? Most people do. The question then becomes are you willing to set aside your prejudices and act on an intellectually consistent application of the principal? Krauthammer, as he frequently does, takes a position that makes everyone on both sides of the debate unhappy, because he shows where both sides are failing to be consistent with their logic.

It made me more aware than ever of the debate that is going on inside the Republican party. What does it mean to be a Republican today? There was a time when we tried to define what it meant to be conservative, and that was the base of the Republican party. However we attracted a great number of people who were socially conservative, and yet who did not completely accept the fiscal conservative views that were mainstream conservatism. George Bush is a perfect example. Conservatives have segmented into groups, fiscal conservatives and social conservatives, and the new group, that believes most of each groups agenda, compassionate conservatives.

Recently another group called neo-conservatives have arisen, and they are currently the pressure behind many of the most intellectually challenging debates going on. They have been described as "liberals who have been mugged by reality". They are frequently ex-libertarians, who have joined the Republican party to change the conservative position of isolationism into a new global activism for good.

Krauthammer is one of them, and he brings to the table their passion for intellectual consistency, something that used to be the trademark of conservatives during the 80s when conservative views were becoming mainstream. They are the reason that the Republican party is such an exciting place to be today. They demand intellectual honesty. And that brings us back to this article. Intellectual honesty says that we must explore the issue of stem cells and cloning with a clear moral definition of what we believe.

Whatever side you are on over the issue of stem cells and cloning, this article will make you think about the issue differently. If you are going to disagree with Krauthammer, you need to understand his explanation of where he stands, and have good reasons for your position. He is being morally and intellectually consistent, and that has to worry you if you disagree with him.

Illegals March Madness

By Dimitri Vassilaros - Friday, March 10, 2006 - Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

The fifth column is marching.

Supporters of illegal immigration, open borders - and perhaps Mexico - have been taking it to the streets of America lately. Protesters are demanding the U.S. Senate kill legislation that would kill the overflow of illegal aliens swamping this republic.

House Resolution 4437, the Border Protection, Antiterrorism and Illegal Immigration Control Act of 2005, is sponsored by James Sensenbrenner Jr., R-Wis. It directs the Department of Homeland Security to "take all actions necessary and appropriate to achieve and maintain operational control over the entire land and maritime border of the United States ... ."

{snip}

"It criminalizes people and does not offer solutions," said Omar N. Lopez, coordinator of a protest march today in the Chicago area by almost 80 organizations. "It calls for the expulsion of undocumented workers."

Maybe after the march Mr. Lopez could explain how one criminalizes a foreigner whose mere presence on American soil makes him an illegal.

The people who are harmed most by illegal aliens are those American citizens who need our help the most. Illegal aliens load up the welfare roles with people who have paid nothing into the system, and who illegally do everything they can to make sure they don't contribute. They do this by working off the books so they don't pay taxes and so they can draw welfare they do not deserve while getting wages they don't report. They lower wages for Americans, and it is total nonsense to say they do jobs Americans will not do.

Do You Like The Music of the 60s?

Reposted as history. Originally posted in March of 2005.


Are you fond of double-entendres, ironies, metaphors, similes, satire or even sarcasm and parody? What about 21st Century global politics?

Mark Steyn is often a great writer. He loves to mix his message with humor. However you have to be sharp to follow him. This is a great read if you like your 21st Century politics livened up by 20th Century music and 19th Century wit. This article is an education in all three.

The Eye Doctor Never Saw It Coming
By Mark Steyn - 08/03/2005 - The Daily Telegraph (U.K.)

I don't suppose Bashar al-Assad has much in common with Eric Clapton - though, come to think of it, "Layla" is a Lebanese name, and there must be a few of them among the smouldering, raven-tressed, black-eyed Beirut babes so fetchingly demanding their nation's freedom on the covers of this week's Economist, Newsweek, Weekly Standard et al. At any rate, Boy Assad has no desire to find himself wailing, "Layla, you got me on my knees."

The point of the article is that "Ju Ju" (the new nickname for George Bush being used by pro democracy Arabs) is driving the agenda in the middle east. By force of will George "W" now has everyone singing "our" song.

Two More Days

Reposted as history. Originally posted in March of 2005.


Old order of US media is cast adrift by anchor's loss
By Gerard Baker - March 5th, 2005 - The Sunday Times (U.K.)

[Dan Rather]is likely to be remembered by half the nation as a despised icon of the left-wing elites that dominate the US media. That critique was underscored in September last year, two months before the US presidential election, when Rather presented a news report purporting to have uncovered damaging information about President Bush’s Vietnam-era service in the National Guard. It quickly became clear that the item was based on forged documents.

On Wednesday, Dan Rather "retires". Goodbye Dan! Your lies will not be missed.

Men In Black

How the Supreme Court is Destroying America
By Mark Levin
Review by Judith Niewiadomski

Ms. Niewiadomski has reviewed a book that everyone needs to read. Most of the corruption of the American Court system starts with the arrogant out of touch justices that Phyllis Schlafly calls "The Supremacists". From the power seizure of Marbury vs Madison, courts have waged a continual battle to dominate our lives and establish the judicial oligarchy that the judges and lawyers seek.

Three strikes is a perfect example. The huge drop in crime that resulted from the passage of these laws has not stopped the legal community from being nearly unanimous in their opposition. The revolving door system that causes over 15,000 murders in America is the fault of the courts, judges and lawyers. You will never get them to admit this. Instead they are already subverting these laws to get their partners in crime, the criminals, back on the streets.

Why is this book so important?

The Supreme Court consists of people no wiser and no more moral than the rest of society. Dr. Levin gives numerous examples of Supreme Court rulings which violate the Constitution: maintaining slavery in the Dred Scott decision; authorizing the internment of Japanese Americans in Korematsu v. United States, and authorizing segregation in Plessy v. Ferguson. The people can do better by exercising their power to legislate. Dr. Levin warns, "The judiciary, operating outside its scope, is the greatest threat to representative government that we face today."

In this review Judith Niewiadomski has done a masterful job of summarizing the points in Mark Levin's excellent book.

Judicial Supremacists and the Despotic Branch

Reposted as history. Originally posted in March of 2005.


Mark Alexander - 3/4/2005 - The Federalist Patriot

"The Constitution...is a mere thing of wax in the hands of the judiciary which they may twist and shape into any form they please." --Thomas Jefferson

Left-judiciary Supremacists -- Justice Anthony Kennedy and Court Jesters Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, David Souter and John Paul Stevens -- cited "national consensus" as a factor in Tuesday's Roper v. Simmons ruling. In other words, they disregarded the Constitution's prescription for federalism and republican government in the name of unmitigated democracy. Which is to say, while riding roughshod over the Ninth and Tenth Amendments as they overturned the laws of 19 states, the Supremes blithely pushed the nation one step closer toward what everyone since Plato has described as governance in its most degenerative form.

This editorial explains the out of touch supremacists new willingness to claim they know what the people want better than the people do, and goes on to describe the growing willingness of the supremacists to rule based on foreign law.

There are times when a group of people talk so exclusively to each other that they lose touch with what is happening around them when it is in conflict with what their group is saying. The famous statement by a leftist leader that she "did not see how Nixon won the Presidency, she didn't know anyone who had voted for him" being a prime example. Though I did not vote for him, I knew many people who voted for Clinton. Can any intelligent person be so cloistered that they do not know a single person from the group that constitutes the majority of an election at any point in time? I think of this whenever the courts claim to speak for the people.

We are now burdened by a court system that is so out of touch in its arrogance, that the supremacists on the bench truly have no idea how the majority of Americans view them. However they claim to know what these people want, though they themselves are too gutless to ever stand for public office in front of the people. They swore an oath to uphold the Constitution and in recent rulings they publicly state their violation of that oath by ruling based on foreign law when it is conflict with the document they swore to uphold.

Is there anything more contemptible than to arrogantly brag about violating your duties?

Fighting Dirty For The Black Vote

Mona Charen - March 4, 2005 - Townhall.com

This is an entirely appropriate article for this time and place. Here in the Roanoke Chowan area, the growing national tendency of black voters to vote Republican bodes well for the chance to end political dominance by socialists and socialist programs promulgated by local and state democrats (especially considering the number of corrupt democrat politicians that have been exposed recently).

While Republicans gained a relatively modest 3 percentage points in the overall black vote between 2000 and 2004, going from 8 percent to 11 percent, the party's performance in several large states was more substantial. In Texas, the GOP won 15 percent; in California, 18 percent; [emphasis added] and in Ohio, 16 percent.

The atrocious record of democrats in the northeastern North Carolina region at bringing economic development has got to end. Our region is the most integrated region in the state. I recently heard that 87% of blacks in North Carolina live east of I95, and the majority of them live in the NE part of the state. That seems excessive, but whatever the numbers, we are pretty equal throughout the area and blacks are a prominent part of our culture. This offers the opportunity of being the role model for true equality in the State and the Nation.

This region will be better served with bipartisan government and the entrepreneurship attitude that Republicans bring to the table, and black democrats are starting to see it. The requirement is that Republicans in Roanoke-Chowan start to believe that blacks are amenable to the Republican message of personal initiative and reach out to them. We must make serious attempts to win them to the Republican side. With hard working role models like Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice, and intellectual leaders like Thomas Sowell and Larry Elder, Republicans are poised to make serious inroads in the black community. However it will not be easy. The democrats are losing. Their normal tendency to fight "dirty" will only get more vicious.

The black community has a huge number of conservatives, people of moral character and religious fervor, hard workers with personal integrity. They are our natural allies. As Mona noted in her article, Republican leaders like Ken Mehlman are now saying "the party of Lincoln and Frederick Douglass is not complete without more African-American support and participation." This is a good message for us.

Nationwide Republicans are learning that if we care about our country, we have to fight for it too. If courageous men can fight for our freedom in Afghanistan and Iraq, dying for our country, why can't we stand up and fight against the mis-characterizations and insults that will be hurled by the democrats. When Arnold Schwarzenegger ran for Governor, the democrats told lies about him that were outrageous . He simply held his head up and ignored them.

He did not reach out to black "leadership" but instead reached out to black "conservatives". The result is the amazing increase in black support for the Republican party in California. That model will serve us well.

Kerry Urges Congress to Honor Communist

by Daniel J. Flynn - Posted Mar 2, 2005 - The Conservative Weekly (Human Events Online)

The Soviet Union awarded W.E.B. Du Bois the Lenin Peace Prize. Maoist China staged a national holiday in his honor in 1959. Now, for reasons unexplained, the Democratic Party's 2004 presidential nominee seeks to honor Du Bois too.

I can't imagine anyone who really knows what John Kerry's political beliefs are will be surprised at this. Anyone who is actively involved in current political dialog cannot have missed how the leaders of today's democratic party KNOWINGLY support the worldwide socialist movement. I suspect that many moderate and patriotic democrats would leave their party if they really understood what their party has become.

Reservists Deserve Protection From Family-Court Mischief

Reposted as history. Originally posted in March of 2005.


Phyllis Schlafly - February 28, 2005 - TownHall.com

The Bradley Amendment, named for former U.S. Sen. Bill Bradley, D-N.Y., takes us back to the cruel days of debtors' prisons. It requires that a child-support debt cannot be retroactively reduced or forgiven, and states enforce this law no matter what the change in a father's income, no matter if he is sent to war [emphasis added] or locked up in prison, no matter if he is unemployed or hospitalized or even dead, no matter if DNA proves he is not the father, and no matter if he is ever allowed to see his children. Charles Dickens famously said, "The law is an ass."

Sometimes it is depressing to read about our courts. There was a time in our nation when the courts were respected, as they generally had judges who were committed to protecting the people from the abuses of politicians and demogogues. Today, the courts are the advocates of the politicians and demogogues. The way family courts abuse the rights of fathers is a perfect example. Phyllis is the first I have heard to compare the way fathers are treated to the insanity of debtor's prisons, but the analogy is apt.

Believing The True Believers

Thomas Sowell - March 1, 2005 - TownHall.com

I have always felt that Thomas Sowell is an amazing writer. Some people explain things in such a clear and compelling way that even if you disagee before you start reading, you change your mind by the time you finish. Thomas is one of these great writers. Here he addersses the issue of campus activism, a problem that is growing worse as our campuses are more and more dominated by administrations who cave in to any form of socialist protest.

Violating my New Year's resolution to stop trying to reason with unreasonable people, I replied, asking if this man would feel all right, if he were a member of a jury, to vote after having heard only the prosecution's case or only the defendant's case. His reply was that he would -- if the people presenting one side of the case were people he knew and trusted.

This article is an excellent explanation of the illogic used by many in support of their political beliefs. When you no longer listen to the other side, democracy starts to fall apart. That has long been the agenda of those who advocate socialism for our nation. They have a famous saying, one man, one vote, one time. That is how they see democracy, as a temporary expedient to getting socialists into power.

The Arabs' Berlin Wall has crumbled

Reposted as history. Originally posted in March of 2005.


By Mark Steyn - 03/01/2005 - The Daily Telegraph (U.K.)

This is not one of the best articles by Steyn I have ever read. You have to read through a little bit of bragging by Steyn. However it has a couple of important points about what Bush and the neocons have started in the middle east, and it ends with a powerful conclusion.

... Charles Johnson, whose Little Green Footballs website has done an invaluable job these past three years presenting the ugly truth about Palestinian death-cultism, reported that he went hunting around the internet for the usual photographs of deliriously happy Gazans dancing in the street and handing out sweets to celebrate the latest addition to the pile of Jew corpses - and, to his surprise, couldn't find any.

Why is all this happening? Answer: January 30.

The middle east has changed forever. This is a point being echoed throughout all recent articles from the middle east. It is interesting that Steyn accepts input from a blogger to support his point. However Steyn ends with a really important quote from another blogger, probably one of the most important new voices in America, Professor Glen Reynolds (Instapundit), "democratization is a process, not an event".

It is true. The tremendous explosion in the power of blogs is really a tribute to the power of the voice of the people. Steyn is one of the voices in the MSM who does not seem to fear the blogs or the bloggers.

Iraqi bloggers significantly influenced bloggers here in America druing the war to believe that there were people who were on our side. The communication we got from them was never reported in the MSM. They told us about the support of the Kurds and the Marsh Arabs and the secular Shiates. During the war bloggers in Iraq were the ones who said early on that Shiates in Iraq would not support Iran because they were Persians not Arabs. This was a time when democrats were still predicting that Iran would join Iraq in fighting us.

Now these same bloggers are transforming the middle east, as there too the new power of Internet communication is changing the ability of leaders to control the "truth". Bloggers there are still spreading the truth. "Democratization is a process". Communication is not all that it takes to make democracy happen. It also takes a desire for equality. However communication allows any people to express their demand for freedom. Democracy thrives on communication, because democracy is a process based on allowing the people to have their say. When everyone demands freedom and has a say, equality under the law is a byproduct.

Democracy is a process!

A powerful process that leads to freedom and peace. Not "peace" in chains, but a just peace. It is happening.

The Pirates of Eminent Domain

Reposted as history. Originally posted in March of 2005.


Jeff Jacoby - February 28, 2005 - townhall.com

"The despotic power . . . of taking private property when state necessity requires, exists in every government," Justice William Paterson wrote in a 1795 case, Vanhorn's Lessee v. Dorrance, but the state must not invoke that power "except in urgent cases."

If you think this is still the law 210 years after the eminent domain limitation on government was embraced as one of our freedoms, you are in for a surprise. Totalitarians have been chipping away our freedoms for years. Judges have long since abandoned any concern with our liberties and are totally concerned with their political agenda. However the total collapse of the right to live in your home without fear of some government bureaucrat seeking to steal it has arrived. All the bureaucrat needs to prove is that one of his cronies will create greater tax revenues. If you don't think that is justice you need to do two things. Read this article. Then write your Senator and congressman very very soon!