Author: kingsjester

64 year old Christian Conservative husband, father, and grandfather who has been writing since April 2010.

The War Against Christianity – Mississippi Fights Back

On By kingsjesterIn Christianity, Politics3 Comments

americanchristianflag 2As I have related before, I live in DeSoto County, Mississippi, in the Northwest Corner of the state, right across Stateline Road from Memphis , TN, where I was born and raised.

A truly remarkable thing happened on Friday in the state of Mississippi. Governor Phil Bryant signed a bill into law. Okay. I know that you’re saying, “KJ, why is a governor, signing a bill passed by his state legislature into law, so remarkable?”

I’m glad you asked. Here is the bill:

House Bill 638

AN ACT TO BE KNOWN AS THE “RELIGIOUS VIEWPOINTS ANTIDISCRIMINATION ACT” OR “SCHOOLCHILDREN’S RELIGIOUS LIBERTIES ACT”; TO PROHIBIT LOCAL SCHOOL DISTRICTS FROM DISCRIMINATING AGAINST STUDENTS BASED ON THEIR EXPRESSION OF RELIGIOUS VIEWPOINTS ON OTHERWISE PERMISSIBLE SUBJECTS; TO REQUIRE SCHOOL DISTRICTS TO ADOPT A POLICY THAT ESTABLISHES A LIMITED PUBLIC FORUM FOR STUDENT SPEAKERS AT SCHOOL EVENTS AND TO REQUIRE SCHOOL DISTRICTS TO PUBLISH A DISCLAIMER STATING THAT THE STUDENTS’ VIEWS DO NOT REFLECT THOSE OF THE DISTRICT; TO CLARIFY THAT STUDENTS MAY EXPRESS THEIR BELIEFS ABOUT RELIGION IN HOMEWORK, ARTWORK AND OTHER ASSIGNMENTS; TO AUTHORIZE STUDENTS TO ORGANIZE PRAYER GROUPS, RELIGIOUS CLUBS AND OTHER RELIGIOUS GATHERINGS TO THE SAME EXTENT THAT STUDENTS ARE PERMITTED TO ORGANIZE OTHER NONCURRICULAR STUDENT ACTIVITIES AND GROUPS; TO REQUIRE SCHOOL DISTRICTS TO ADOPT A POLICY REGARDING LIMITED PUBLIC FORUMS AND VOLUNTARY EXPRESSION OF RELIGIOUS VIEWPOINTS; TO PROVIDE A MODEL POLICY ON STUDENT EXPRESSION OF RELIGIOUS VIEWPOINTS AND STUDENT SPEAKERS WHICH SCHOOL DISTRICTS MAY ADOPT; TO AMEND SECTION 37-13-4.1, MISSISSIPPI CODE OF 1972, IN CONFORMITY TO THE PROVISIONS OF THIS ACT; TO BRING FORWARD SECTION 37-13-4, MISSISSIPPI CODE OF 1972, WHICH PROVIDES THAT TEACHERS AND SCHOOL ADMINISTRATORS MAY PERMIT THE VOLUNTARY PARTICIPATION BY STUDENTS IN PRAYER, FOR PURPOSES OF POSSIBLE AMENDMENT; TO BRING FORWARD SECTION 37-13-161, MISSISSIPPI CODE OF 1972, WHICH PROVIDES THAT LOCAL SCHOOL BOARDS MAY ALLOW REFERENCES TO RELIGION IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS WHEN THE REFERENCES DO NOT CONSTITUTE AID TO ANY RELIGIOUS SECT OR A SECTARIAN PURPOSE, FOR PURPOSES OF POSSIBLE AMENDMENT; AND FOR RELATED PURPOSES.

What this bill does is to allow students to initiate prayers in school and at student activities, to reference their religious beliefs in their schoolwork, both their assignments completed at school and their homework, as well. The bill also allows Mississippi’s students to speak to their classmates about their faith, to “give their witness” as we believers refer to our own personal testimony as to what God has done in our lives.

You will recall, in August of 2011, the Freedom From Religion Foundation, a supposedly 13,000 member organization, led by a bitter ex-minister and his equally bitter wife, came down to the Magnolia state , to attempt to ban prayers at high school football games. They prevailed…sort of.

As I wrote, on August 27, 2011,  in a post titled ” The War Against Christianity in America – Battleground: DeSoto County, MS”:

DeSoto County Schools went along with the Freedom From Religion Foundation’s request, despite the disappointment of many students and parents.

And that’s when Americans started organizing.

Y’see, teammates traditionally would take a knee after the game to thank the Lord for a good game and His blessings and to pray for those injured during the game.  And their parents were bound and determined that their young men were not going to have that freedom taken away from them.

So, last night, instead of the coach telling the team to take a knee, the quarterback did.

Earlier, on Friday morning, students and parents held a prayer walk outside DeSoto County Schools.

As the bright, blessed day gave way to the dark, sacred night in DeSoto County, parents and students began to pray.

…Per the local newspaper, the DeSoto Times Tribune:

At the Olive Branch game, spectators began to pray the Lord’s Prayer in unison around 7:15 p.m. just moments before the Olive Branch High School Conquistadors and Memphis Trezevant took to the field.

The same was the case at Hernando High School just prior to kickoff against Pontotoc.

The Rev. Mike Coker, pastor of the Refuge Church in Hernando led a prayer outside Tiger Stadium before the game and encouraged people in the crowd to pray.

After the singing of the national anthem, people in the stands recited the Lord’s Prayer.

A large group of Horn Lake High School and Lake Cormorant High School parents also joined in saying the Lord’s just prior to the Horn Lake – Lake Cormorant football game at Horn Lake.

The group prayer was not sponsored by the DeSoto County School system and was led by parents, not teachers or administrators.

Here is, as my preacher says, is The Big Idea:

What Mississippi has done, in the passing of this bill, is to affirm Mississippians’ Constitutional rights as stated in the First Amendment:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

It will be no shock, that come August, the FFRF will come back down, from the Great White North, with severe, frowning countenances, whining and crying that promoting faith in Mississippi Schools will be offensive and oppressive to those children who don’t have any faith. (Did he just say that?)

The problem they will have, is the fact that participation will be voluntary. They don’t have to include any references to REligion in any of their schoolwork. They do have to attend any Faith-based activities initiated by their fellow students. They don’t have to pray.

Let’s face it. Our children are under attack, by forces seen and unseen, by “princes and principalities”, if you will.

Through political ideology-driven curriculum such as Common Core and programs such as the president’s anti-bullying campaign, a seemingly innocuous program, whose stated purpose is to promote tolerance, and is actually an attempt to mainstream homosexuality, our schools have been invaded by the pestilence known as “progressivism”, or secular humanism. The same pervasive disease that is teaching our children that they are their own god, that there  there are no moral absolutes, and that ethics are situational.

I make no bones about it. I am a Christian American Conservative. I pray daily. And, as I write this, I’m preparing to go to church this morning. If it were up to Barack Hussein Obama, his minions, and those supposedly on “our” side of the aisle, whom I’ve labeled the “Vichy Republicans”, I would be forced to leave my faith at the church door. What they don’t understand, is, the Author and Finisher of my faith is not Obama, Boehner, or anyone else up there on Capitol Hill.

I answer to Someone waaay about their pay grade.

Progressives do not understand Christians at all. They believe that our faith is something that can be taken off and put back on again, as one would a shirt.

They don’t have a clue.

So, why did Mississippians back this bill, provides the impetus for it to be signed into law by our Governor?

Was it simply because we were mad at that bunch of carpetbaggin’ Yankees from the FFRF?

Nope. It’s For The Children.  

Until He Comes,

KJ

With Freedom Comes Responsibility

On By kingsjesterIn Uncategorized4 Comments

americaneagleflagHave you ever thought about what it truly means to be free?

Does “Freedom” mean that you can run naked down the street and then through a playground of young children? Does it mean that you can marry a 9 year old? Does it mean that you can smoke a lid of marijuana, go out and get in your car, have an accident, and maim or kill somebody?

Outside Independence Hall when the Constitutional Convention of 1787 ended, Mrs. Powel of Philadelphia asked Benjamin Franklin, “Well, Doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?” With no hesitation whatsoever, Franklin responded, “A republic, if you can keep it.”

What did he mean by that? Was he merely speaking of the inner workings of the Federal Government, which he and the Founding Fathers so masterfully designed?

Or, was he talking about this complex matter known as American Freedom?

Ronald Reagan said,

Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same.

Was Ronaldus Magnus speaking about our Freedom as a nation? Or, the freedom of the individual?

The answer is yes. Both.

President Reagan knew how fragile this precious thing called freedom is. So did Dr. Franklin.

Dr. Franklin, along with our other Founding Fathers, pledged his life, his fortune, and his sacred honor in pursuit of it.

When he made that now-famous quote to Mrs. Powel, he was expressing his worry that seceding generations, having attained their freedom so easily, might grow lackadaisical and so spoiled by it, that they would squander it through self-indulgence. Franklin was, in fact, so leery of losing this new republic that he said,

Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.

He was afraid that Americans would rely and trust those in power over them to the extent that they would surrender their freedom to them.

Sound familiar? Does the phrase “gun control” ring a bell?

I know that it is a phrase which you have no doubt heard before, but, as I write this blog, we are closer to losing this fragile American Freedom, than we have been since my parent’s generation, known as “the Greatest Generation”.

Please allow me to relate to you a story about my Daddy (a Southern colloquialism denoting a male parental unit), an average young man, tossed into a situation beyond his wildest imagination. One of those “fight or flight situations” all the psychiatrists like to theorize about in the Halls of Academia.  However, this was no theory. This situation was as real as it gets:

By the time the sun set on June 6, 1944,more than 9,000 Allied soldiers were dead or wounded, and more than 100,000 had made it ashore, capturing French coastal villages. Within weeks, supplies were being unloaded at Utah and Omaha beachheads at the rate of more than 20,000 tons per day. By June 11, more than 326,000 troops, 55,000 vehicles, and 105,000 tons of supplies had been landed on the beaches. By June 30, the Allies had established a firm foothold in Normandy. Allied forces crossed the River Seine on August 19.

There has never been an exact count of the sacrifices made on D-Day. Although, it is estimated that more than 425,000 Allied and German troops were killed, wounded, or went missing during the battle. 209,000 of those who lost their lives were Allied forces.

Among the young men who stepped off those boats, in a hail of gunfire, was a fellow named Edward, whom everyone called Ned, from the small town of Helena, Arkansas.  Already in his young life, Ned had been forced to drop out of school in the sixth grade, in order to work at the local movie theater to help support his mother, brother, and sister faced with the ravages of the Great Depression.

He was a gentle man who loved to laugh and sing, having recorded several 78 rpm records in the do-it-yourself booths of the day. And now, he found himself, a Master Sergeant in an Army Engineering Unit, stepping off of a boat into the unknown, watching his comrades being mercilessly gunned down around him.

Ned, along with the rest of his unit who survived the initial assault, would go on to assist in the cleaning out of the Concentration Camps, bearing witness to man’s inhumanity to man.

The horrors he saw had a profound effect on Ned.  One that he would keep to himself for the remainder of his life.  While my older sisters and I knew that he served with an Engineering Unit in World War II, we did not know the full extent of his service, until we found his medal, honoring his participation in the Invasion of Normandy, going through his belongings after he passed away on December 29, 1997.

There are a number of Americans nowadays who seem to believe that “Freedom” is merely a personal thing, a state which is unaffected by any unethical, immoral, or irresponsible actions committed by those around them, including family, friends, or strangers. They, in turn, seem oblivious of their responsibility to other Americans, as we all attempt to protect and nurture this fragile thing we call “Freedom”.

Our Legacy of Freedom, bequeathed to us as American citizens, is not  just the blessing of being a free people, but, the responsibility that goes with it, as my Daddy knew all too well…

a responsibility to our family, our friends, our fellow citizens, and the Author of Our Freedom as Americans, Our Creator.

A responsibility that is our charge to keep.

Until He Comes, 

KJ

CPAC 2013: The Start of the Second Reagan Revolution?

On By kingsjesterIn Politics1 Comment

reaganThanks to The Petulant President overplaying his hand in the first two months of his second term as the Leader of the Free World, America’s Political Pendulum, which began swinging to the right with the 2010 Mid-Term Elections, is now seemingly traveling at breakneck speed. And, it’s about cotton-pickin’ time!

The CPAC Convention provides us ample evidence of this. What is CPAC, you ask?

In 1973, a small group of conservative activists met in Washington to discuss the future of the conservative movement.

This meeting, convened by the American Conservative Union, resolved that an annual event was needed to rally conservatives, share strategies and promulgate and crystallize the best of the conservative thought in America. This meeting was thus the birth of the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC).

In 1974, then-Governor Ronald Reagan was the featured speaker at the first CPAC Presidential Banquet. President Reagan’s 1974 speech set a strong, uncompromisingly pro-freedom agenda for the conservatives, building upon the foundation established by Senator Barry Goldwater’s presidential campaign a decade earlier.

This speech and this CPAC were to become the catalysts for building a grassroots movement which has now, after 40 years, culminated in conservatism emerging as the dominant American political philosophy.

Taking place in Washington, D.C. each year, and now in regions across the country, CPAC educates, brings together and energizes thousands of attendees and all of the leading conservative organizations and speakers who impact conservative thought in the nation. From Presidents of the United States to college students, CPACs have become the place to find our nation’s current and future leaders and sets the conservative agenda each year.

Here are excerpts from the three best moments of yesterday:

Sen. Marco Rubio’s patriotism excited the crowd.

NBCNews.com reports that:

“We don’t need a new idea. The idea’s America, and it still works,” said Rubio, to major applause, anticipating that liberals would criticize his remarks for offering no new ideas.

…”Just because I believe that states should have the right to define marriage in a traditional way does not make me a bigot,” he said.

“The people who are actually close-minded in American politics are the people that love to preach about the certainty of science in regards to our climate, but ignore the absolute fact that science has proven that life begins at conception,” Rubio added.

Providing his prescription for the GOP as it searches for a winning path forward, Rubio said: “Our challenge is to create an agenda applying our principles — our principles, they still work — applying our time-tested principles to the challenges of today.”

Then Gov. Rick Perry showed ’em how it’s done in Texas.

Realclearpolitics.com reports

“The popular media narrative is that this country has shifted away from conservative ideals, as evidenced by the last two presidential elections. That’s what they think. That’s what say. That might be true if Republicans had actually nominated conservative candidates in 2008 and 2012,” Gov. Rick Perry (R-Texas) said in his address at CPAC this afternoon.

Perry also slammed President Obama for undocumented illegal immigration being released from detention centers due to sequestration cuts.

“This president’s posture, it’d be laughable if he hadn’t taken it one step too far, dangerously releasing criminals onto our streets to make a political point,” Perry told the crowd at CPAC. “When you have a federally-sponsored jailbreak, and don’t get confused, that’s exactly what that is — when you’ve had a federally-sponsored jailbreak, you’ve crossed the line from politics of spin to politics as a craven form of cynicism.”

And, Sen. Rand Paul Hit the Vichy Republicans right between the eyes.

Realclearpolitics.com reports

The GOP of old has grown stale and moss-covered. I don’t think we need to name any names, do we? Our party is encumbered by an inconsistent approach to freedom. The new GOP will need to embrace liberty in both the economic and the personal sphere. If we’re going to have a Republican party that can win, liberty needs to be the backbone of the GOP. We must have a message that is broad, our vision must be broad, and that vision must be based on freedom.

There are millions of Americans, young and old, native and immigrant, black, white and brown, who simply seek to live free, to practice a religion, free to choose where their kids go to school, free to choose their own health care, free to keep the fruits of their labor, free to live without government constantly being on their back. I will stand for them. I will stand for you. I will stand for our prosperity and our freedom, and I ask everyone who values liberty to stand with me. Thank you. God bless America.

The greatest American President in my lifetime, Ronald Wilson Reagan, spoke at CPAC in 1975. His speech was so “on point”, if you close your eyes, you can imagine him speaking at this year’s convention. Here are the highlights:

  • Since our last meeting we have been through a disastrous election. It is easy for us to be discouraged, as pundits hail that election as the repudiation of our philosophy and even as a mandate of some kind or other. But the significance of the election was not registered by those who voted but by those who stayed home. If there was anything like a mandate it will be found among almost two-thirds of the citizens who refused to participate.

  • Bitter as it is to accept the results of the November election, we should have reason for some optimism. For many years now we have been preached “the gospel,” in opposition to the philosophy of so-called liberalism which was, in truth, a call to collectivism.
  • I don’t know about you, but I am impatient with those Republicans who after the last election rushed into print saying, “We must broaden the base of our party” – when what they meant was to fuzz up and blur even more the difference between ourselves and our opponents.
  • It was a feeling that there was not a sufficient difference now between the parties that kept a majority of the voters away from the polls. When have we ever advocated a closed-door policy? Who has ever been barred from participating?
  • Our people look for a cause to believe in. Is it a third party we need, or is it a new and revitalized second party, raising a banner of no pale pastels, but bold colors which make it unmistakably clear where we stand on all of the issues troubling the people?
  • Let us show that we stand for fiscal integrity and sound money and above all for an end to deficit spending, with ultimate retirement of the national debt.
  • Let us also include a permanent limit on the percentage of the people’s earnings government can take without their consent.
  • Let our banner proclaim a genuine tax reform that will begin by simplifying the income tax so that workers can compute their obligation without having to employ legal help.
  • Let us also call for an end to the nitpicking, the harassment and overregulation of business and industry which restricts expansion and our ability to compete in world markets.
  • Let us explore ways to ward off socialism, not by increasing government’s coercive power, but by increasing participation by the people in the ownership of our industrial machine.
  • A political party cannot be all things to all people. It must represent certain fundamental beliefs which must not be compromised to political expediency, or simply to swell its numbers.
  • I do not believe I have proposed anything that is contrary to what has been considered Republican principle. It is at the same time the very basis of conservatism. It is time to reassert that principle and raise it to full view.

  • And if there are those who cannot subscribe to these principles, then let them go their way.

For the Republicans to remain a viable party, they must return to their small government Conservative roots.

A Moderate Republican Candidate will not win the Presidency in 2016.  Dole, McCain, and Romney are living proof of it.

Americans are ready for a second Reagan Revolution.

We already have the set-up man: Carter on steroids.

Until He Comes,

KJ

Welcome to the USSA: Now, About That “Right to Privacy”…

On By kingsjesterIn Politics3 Comments

obamabigbro Your personal information is no longer personal.

Per Reuters.com:

The Obama administration is drawing up plans to give all U.S. spy agencies full access to a massive database that contains financial data on American citizens and others who bank in the country, according to a Treasury Department document seen by Reuters.

The proposed plan represents a major step by U.S. intelligence agencies to spot and track down terrorist networks and crime syndicates by bringing together financial databanks, criminal records and military intelligence. The plan, which legal experts say is permissible under U.S. law, is nonetheless likely to trigger intense criticism from privacy advocates.

Financial institutions that operate in the United States are required by law to file reports of “suspicious customer activity,” such as large money transfers or unusually structured bank accounts, to Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN).

The Federal Bureau of Investigation already has full access to the database. However, intelligence agencies, such as the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency, currently have to make case-by-case requests for information to FinCEN.

The Treasury plan would give spy agencies the ability to analyze more raw financial data than they have ever had before, helping them look for patterns that could reveal attack plots or criminal schemes.

The planning document, dated March 4, shows that the proposal is still in its early stages of development, and it is not known when implementation might begin.

Financial institutions file more than 15 million “suspicious activity reports” every year, according to Treasury. Banks, for instance, are required to report all personal cash transactions exceeding $10,000, as well as suspected incidents of money laundering, loan fraud, computer hacking or counterfeiting.

“For these reports to be of value in detecting money laundering, they must be accessible to law enforcement, counter-terrorism agencies, financial regulators, and the intelligence community,” said the Treasury planning document.

A Treasury spokesperson said U.S. law permits FinCEN to share information with intelligence agencies to help detect and thwart threats to national security, provided they adhere to safeguards outlined in the Bank Secrecy Act. “Law enforcement and intelligence community members with access to this information are bound by these safeguards,” the spokesperson said in a statement.

Some privacy watchdogs expressed concern about the plan when Reuters outlined it to them.

A move like the FinCEN proposal “raises concerns as to whether people could find their information in a file as a potential terrorist suspect without having the appropriate predicate for that and find themselves potentially falsely accused,” said Sharon Bradford Franklin, senior counsel for the Rule of Law Program at the Constitution Project, a non-profit watchdog group.

Despite these concerns, legal experts emphasize that this sharing of data is permissible under U.S. law. Specifically, banks’ suspicious activity reporting requirements are dictated by a combination of the Bank Secrecy Act and the USA PATRIOT Act, which offer some privacy safeguards.

Speaking of records, are you aware that your medical records are in the process of being digitized?

JudicialWatch.org reports that

In a classic example of how government blows through your tax dollars, billions have been squandered on a faulty electronic medical records system that operates with no oversight and continues receiving big wads of cash from Uncle Sam.

It gets better; by the time it’s all said and done—in about four more years according to government estimates—American taxpayers will have been fleeced $6.6 billion! It’s all part of the Obama Administration’s hostile takeover of the nation’s healthcare system. The idea behind this plan is to switch medical records from paper to digital to create a centralized system that supposedly improves the quality of health care.

The overhaul won’t come cheap and the government is offering hospitals and doctors billions to switch to electronic medical records. The money has come largely from President Obama’s fraud-infested $787 billion stimulus which was supposed to jump start the economy and put Americans back to work. Instead the economy is a disaster as the nation suffers through a staggering $16 trillion (and growing) deficit and unemployment is at record highs.

This has not affected the cash flow to government programs, however. In this case the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) is the agency that cuts the checks to healthcare providers that agree to switch to electronic records. So far CMS has doled out $3.6 billion to 74,317 medical providers, but the agency doesn’t bother following up to assure the money is appropriately spent. In fact, CMS fails to verify if providers are meeting the required quality goals, according to a federal audit released this week.

Investigators from the Department of Health and Human Services Inspector General warn in their report that the electronic records program is vulnerable to abuse. Furthermore, they say immediate efforts should be made to strengthen oversight and prevent tax dollars from being wasted. This is not an unreasonable request considering doctors receive up to $44,000 and hospitals a minimum of $ 2 million to switch from paper to digital records.

Here is the scary response, included in the HHS watchdog report, from the head of the CMS (Marilyn Tavenner) on the idea of requiring healthcare providers to prove they’re meeting quality requirements before they get U.S. tax dollars. It would be burdensome, Tavenner said, and it would “significantly delay payments.” Spoken like at true government bureaucrat!

Michelle Malkin adds:

Oversight is lax. Cronyism is rife. The job-killing and privacy-undermining consequences have only just begun.

The program was originally sold as a cost-saving measure. In theory, modernizing record-collection is a good idea, and many private health care providers have already made the change. But as with many government “incentive” programs, the EMR bribe is a tax-subsidized, one-size-fits-all mandate. This one pressures health care professionals and hospitals across the country into radically federalizing their patient data and opening up medical information to untold abuse. Penalties kick in for any provider that hasn’t switched over by 2014.

So, what’s it to you? Well, $4 billion has already gone out to 82,535 professionals and 1,474 hospitals, and a total of $6 billion will be doled out by 2016. But the feds’ reckless profligacy, neglect and favoritism have done more harm than good.

Don’t take my word for it. A recent report released by the Department of Health and Human Services Inspector General acknowledged that the incentive system is “vulnerable to paying incentives to professionals and hospitals that do not fully meet” the program’s quality assurance requirements. The federal health bureaucracy “has not implemented strong prepayment safeguards, and its ability to safeguard incentive payments postpayment is also limited,” the IG concluded.

Translation: No one is actually verifying whether the transition from paper to electronic is improving patient outcomes and health services. No one is actually guarding against GIGO (garbage in, garbage out). No one is checking whether recipients of the EMR incentives are receiving money redundantly (e.g., raking in payments when they’ve already converted to electronic records). No one is actually protecting private data from fraud, abuse or exploitation.

Little is being done to recoup ill-gotten payments. In any case, such “pay and chase” policing after the fact is a crummy way to run government in lean times — or in fat times, for that matter.

Allow me to summarize all of this for you. The bottom line is this: The Obama Administration is gathering information about us (The Proletariat) in a manner eerily reminiscent of the old Russian Politboro.

Americans are not going to be able to buy a Big Gulp or have a hangnail removed without the Federal Government knowing about it.

Ted Cruz, Republican Senator from Texas, hit the nail on the head, when he said,

I think President Obama is the most radical president this nation’s ever seen. And in particular, I think he is a true believer in government control of the economy and of our everyday lives. In my judgment, we are facing what I consider to be the epic battle of our generation, quite literally the battle over whether we remain a free market nation.

Hang tough, Americans.

Until He Comes,

KJ

Hey, Bloomie. C’mon Down to Mississippi. I’ll Buy You a Barbeque Sammich and a Sweet Tea Big Gulp.

On By kingsjesterIn Politics2 Comments

bloombergobamaAs I have related before, I live in DeSoto County, in the Northwest corner of Mississippi. I moved across the state line from Memphis, back in 1997, after the Mayor of Memphis told me that hard-working taxpayers, like myself, were no longer wanted there. But I digress…

My state made me very proud yesterday, as it took a stand for freedom.

NationalReview.com reports

New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg’s soda ban may have been struck down yesterday, but lawmakers in Mississippi have taken action to prevent similar initiatives in their state by passing what is being called the “Anti-Bloomberg Bill.” The bill would prevent Mississippi counties, cities, and towns from passing laws that require restaurants to post calorie counts, limit portion sizes, and bar toys from kids’ meals. Republican Governor Phil Bryant is expected to sign the bill later this month, according to National Public Radio.

The bill has attracted bipartisan support, with members of both parties rallying behind the cause. It sailed through Mississippi’s state Senate by a 50 to 1 margin earlier this month. “If you want 1,000 sodas, you can still do that,” said the Democratic congressman who introduced the bill.

The bill has its detractors, though. Critics cite the fact that Mississippi is ranked among the unhealthiest in the country and boasts the nation’s highest obesity rate.

The bill, SENATE BILL NO. 2687, begins

1 AN ACT TO RESERVE TO THE LEGISLATURE ANY REGULATION OF

2 CONSUMER INCENTIVE ITEMS AND NUTRITION LABELING FOR FOOD THAT IS A

3 MENU ITEM IN RESTAURANTS, FOOD ESTABLISHMENTS AND VENDING

4 MACHINES; TO SPECIFY THAT THE ACT WOULD NOT AFFECT THE FEDERAL

5 REGULATION OF NUTRITION LABELING UNDER EXISTING FEDERAL LAW; AND

6 FOR RELATED PURPOSES.

Meanwhile, up in The Big Apple, where Liberalism is out of control, Judge Martin A. Tingling told Nanny Mayor Bloomberg that his decree banning Big Gulps was way out of line.

As the New York Times reports,

In his ruling, Justice Tingling concurred with much of the beverage industry’s legal arguments. He said the Board of Health, which is appointed by the mayor, had overreached in approving the plan, and wrote that the City Council was the only legislative body with the power to approve such a far-reaching initiative.

The administration, Justice Tingling wrote, had interpreted the board’s powers broadly enough to “create an administrative Leviathan,” capable of enacting any rules and “limited only by its own imagination.”

The judge also criticized the rules themselves, noting they would apply only to certain sugared drinks — dairy-based beverages like milkshakes, for instance, would be exempt — and be enforced only in certain establishments, like restaurants and delis, but not others, like convenience stores and bodegas. The rules, the judge wrote, would create “uneven enforcement, even within a particular city block, much less the city as a whole.”

…On Monday, a spokesman for the American Beverage Association said that the court decision “provides a sigh of relief.”

“With this ruling behind us, we look forward to collaborating with city leaders on solutions that will have a meaningful and lasting impact on the people of New York City,” the spokesman, Christopher Gindlesperger, said.

It is unclear if the appeal of the case will be resolved before Mr. Bloomberg leaves office at the end of this year. His would-be successors are mixed in their views of the measure and may not share his zeal on the issue.

The mayor appears increasingly preoccupied with his legacy, and recently hired two public relations advisers — a former Times editor, Arthur Pincus, and a former television reporter, Andrew Kirtzman — to shape the public perception of the Bloomberg era.

Asked on Monday if he was concerned that a drawn-out legal battle over the soda limits could spill into the administration of a successor who does not favor them, Mr. Bloomberg, sounding a bit irked, muttered, “All of our time is running out,” before saying, “I don’t know who is going to be my successor.”

The mayor added: “People are dying every day. This is not a joke. This is about real lives.”

Speaking of “real lives”, I am certain that the majority of New Yorkers are glad that Rudy was their mayor on September 11, 2001, and this idiot, Bloomie, was not. While Rudy showed decsive, prudent leadership in a time of crisis, this babbling fool would have been running around like a chicken with his head cut off, trying to apologize to the murderous Muslims, for putting up the Twin Towers, which obviously offended them.

Thomas Jefferson wrote

Our greatest happiness does not depend on the condition of life in which chance has placed us, but is always the result of a good conscience, good health, occupation, and freedom in all just pursuits. 

First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt wrote

Freedom makes a huge requirement of every human being. With freedom comes responsibility. For the person who is unwilling to grow up, the person who does not want to carry is own weight, this is a frightening prospect.

All I heard from the Liberal Main Stream Media yesterday, when the news about my state’s Anti-Bloomberg Bill was announced, was how Mississippi was “the fattest state in the Union”. Nothing was said about how Bloomberg’s ludicrous ban was a out-of-bounds restriction on New Yorkers’ freedom as Americans.

As we are experiencing during the beginning of the second term of The Lightbringer, with his attacks on our right to bare arms and our country’s Judeo-Christian belief system, upon which our Founding Documents were written, and his fellow Liberals, like his wife, Michelle’s and Mayor Bloomberg’s, desire to control what we eat and feed our children, and even our pets, Mrs. Roosevelt is being proven to have been exactly right.

The Personal Freedom that Americans have enjoyed since the birth of our nation is as abhorrent to Liberals as a crucifix is to a vampire.

Until He Comes,

KJ

“Sequester” Must Mean “Party” in Kenyan

On By kingsjesterIn Politics4 Comments

marie-antoinette-obamaSo, here we are , in the middle of a sequester, which is predicted to last a decade. Obama has cut services to our Armed Forces, and other necessary government functions, in a macabre effort to make his own suggestion, sequestration, as painful to average Americans as possible, in order to (in his egocentric mind) garner popularity for his Tax and Spend Economic Policies.

TheHill.com reports that

President Obama warned Saturday that automatic spending cuts known as the sequester threaten to stifle the surge in job growth the nation saw in February.

Switching from the adversarial tone he has used to pressure Republican leaders in recent weeks, the president appealed to what he called the vision both parties share for the country.

“As Democrats and Republicans, we may disagree on the best way to achieve our goals, but I’m confident we can agree on what those goals should be,” Obama said in his weekly address.

He cited a vibrant middle class, an education system that gives more workers the skills to compete in the job market, a reformed immigration system and “safer streets for our children,” a veiled reference to gun-violence reforms.

Obama acknowledged that progress on these issues “won’t be easy,” but sounded an optimistic tone.

“I still believe that compromise is possible. I still believe we can come together to do big things. And I know there are leaders on the other side who share that belief,” he said.

The president touted the February jobs report from the Labor Department showing the economy grew by 236,000 jobs and the unemployment rate fell to 7.7 percent.

Wall Street analysts had predicted a job spurt between 150,000 and 160,000. In response, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rallied 67 points on Friday to close at an all-time high.

Obama noted the unemployment rate is now lower than when he took office after businesses created 6.4 million jobs over the past three years.

But he warned partisan battles in Washington could disrupt the recovery:

“The last thing we should do is allow Washington politics to get in the way,” he said. “You deserve better than the same political gridlock and refusal to compromise that has too often passed for serious debate over the last few years.”

He touted his recent outreach to Republicans, including a dinner with a dozen senators at the Jefferson Hotel in downtown Washington on Wednesday.

He said the group discussed “smarter ways to grow our economy and reduce our deficits than the arbitrary cuts of the so-called ‘sequester’ that recently went into place.”

Average Americans’ jobs are not coming back any time soon, under this Administration’s Failed Economic Policy.

However, Obama’s staff is doing just fine, thankyaverymuch.

Per FoxNews.com:

The latest 2012 salary figures released by the White House show 20 staffers were making the maximum $172,200. Many of them are well-known President Obama aides, including Press Secretary Jay Carney and senior adviser Valerie Jarrett. Most carry the title of “assistant to the president.”

But underneath them are dozens of “deputy” assistants and “special” assistants to the president, most making six-figure salaries — like the climate change advisers. A review of the 2012 salaries by FoxNews.com shows 139 White House staffers making $100,000 or more.

The White House often attracts top-tier lawyers, bankers, security experts and others who were making far more in the private sector. Any administration wants to offer good money in order to lure the right people into — or back into — public service.

But the payroll under the Obama White House has expanded since the Bush administration. The payroll went from $33 million in 2008 to $39 million in 2009. Since then, the Obama administration has scaled back its White House staff expenses, but the payroll was still at $37.8 million in 2012.

There are two more employees making the maximum salary now than in the final year of the Bush administration. Two ethics advisers each make close to $140,000.

The chief calligrapher makes $96,725. Another calligrapher makes over $94,000, while another makes close to $86,000.

On Friday, White House Deputy Press Secretary John Earnest said the White House will be affected by the sequester much like other agencies — and in some capacity will impose furloughs.

“We’re also faced with making some tough decisions when it comes to ongoing projects, when it comes to purchasing equipment and supplies. But we’re also a pretty personnel-heavy agency, if you will. So that means … there will be employees of components who work here at the White House that will be facing pay cuts, that will be facing furloughs,” he said.

Hey…no worries in the Former “People’s House”…the Obamas are not about to let poor stewardship of our nation’s economy and a minor problem like average Americans struggling to survive, stand in the way of a good par-tay!

According to Ben Shapiro, in an article, posted on Breitbart.com,

The same week that President Obama’s administration announced that due to sequestration, White House tours would be cancelled, sources at the White House announced that it would be hosting megastars Adele and Beyonce at Michelle’s 50th birthday party next year. “America’s First Lady will be holding a huge celebrity-packed party for her birthday at the White House next year and, as she adores Adele and Beyonce, she has asked them both to sing,” the source told the UK Daily Mail. The source did say that “The Obamas will pay Adele’s expenses as it’s a private party, not a State one.”

But will they pay all the expenses of the party? Security arrangements? Food? Cleanup? White House parties are expensive affairs.

It’s obvious that the White House’s priorities don’t lie with the people. They lie with the personal party predilections of the Obamas.

While the Secret Service protection during White House tours costs some $74,000 per week – the cost the White House brags it is saving on the cancelled tours — Air Force One costs $175,750 per flight hour, not including pilots, airmen, and Secret Service. (Some sources say the cost for the tours is $18,000 per week.) Obama has taken several pricey jaunts to locations including, most recently, Florida in the past few months. And those parties at the White House? They certainly cost a fair bit of money, but we’ll never hear how much; as the Washington Post put it back in 2012, “getting a straight answer about the cost of any White House party is almost impossible.”

There is little chance that the taxpayers will not foot some of the expense of Mrs. Obama’s magical 50th. And there is no chance that the “people’s house” will be open to the “people” nearly as much as it is to the Obamas’ celebrity superfriends in coming weeks.

As I’ve written before:

OUR Income = HIS Revenue

Let them eat arugula!

Until He Comes,

KJ

Karzai Links Obama to the Taliban. This is Smart Power?

On By kingsjesterIn Politics2 Comments

Obama-Shrinks-2Back in January , President Karzai of Afghanistan and U.S. President Barack Hussein Obama (mm mmm mmmm) had a meeting, where it was decided to speed up America’ s military withdrawal from that war-torn nation. The two presidents seem to have gotten along famously.

Well…that honeymoon’s over.

Bloomberg.com reports that

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel was greeted on his first visit to Afghanistan since taking office by suicide bombs, threats and Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s accusation that the U.S. is colluding with the Taliban.

As Hagel prepared to leave a U.S. military compound in Kabul on March 9, a Taliban suicide bomber blew himself up outside the Ministry of Defense, and another suicide bomb detonated in Khost province. Yesterday, Karzai said that those attacks, which together killed 19 people, aided U.S. goals. A joint Hagel-Karzai press conference at the presidential palace was canceled for what Pentagon officials said were security reasons.

While the Taliban said the attacks were aimed at sending a message to Hagel that the insurgents remain a powerful force, Karzai said in a speech yesterday that the U.S. is holding peace talks with the radical Islamists and the bombs were in the “service of America.”

“On the surface and to this outside observer, it appears that Karzai has gone way off the reservation, perhaps more so than he has in the past,” said David Maxwell, a retired U.S. Army colonel who’s associate director of the Center for Security Studies at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service. “I cannot see how we could work with such an apparently delusional leader much longer, but unfortunately I do not know if we have any other good options.”

Karzai’s allegations and the suicide attacks gave the new defense secretary, who took office March 1, a close-up view of the military and political obstacles the Obama administration faces as it tries to extricate the U.S. from a war it’s been waging for more than 11 years, train Afghan forces to take over the fight, root out official corruption, curb opium trafficking, and develop the Afghan economy.

President Barack Obama has ordered the withdrawal of 34,000 of about 68,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan by February. Former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said last month that the drawdown will occur in stages, with the force dropping to 50,000 by November, after the summer fighting season, and then to 34,000 by February. More troops will come home after Afghan elections planned for early 2014, Panetta said.

“When you spend 48 hours in Afghanistan or any part of the world that’s still dangerous, you again recognize the complications that exist every day in these parts of the world,” Hagel, a combat veteran of Vietnam, told reporters at a U.S. military base after he met with Karzai yesterday. Asked about Karzai’s accusation that the U.S. was colluding with the Taliban, Hagel said he “spoke clearly and directly” to Karzai on the matter. Hagel didn’t elaborate.

Earlier yesterday, Marine Corps General Joseph Dunford, head of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s International Security Assistance Force, said the Afghan president’s comments were “categorically false.”

Perhaps, Karzai is a just a  wee bit torqued over all the unmanned drones flying over his country:

With debate intensifying in the United States over the use of drone aircraft, the U.S. military said on Sunday that it had removed data about air strikes carried out by unmanned planes in Afghanistan from its monthly air power summaries.

U.S. Central Command, which oversees the Afghanistan war, said in a statement the data had been removed because it was “disproportionately focused” on the use of weapons by the remotely piloted aircraft as it was published only when strikes were carried out – which happened during only 3 percent of sorties. Most missions were for reconnaissance, it said.

U.S. President Barack Obama’s administration has increasingly used drones to target against al Qaeda-linked militants overseas.

Civilian casualties from drone strikes have raised ethical concerns and angered local populations, creating tension between the United States and Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Some U.S. lawmakers have also questioned the legality of targeted killings and whether drones would allow the killing of American citizens inside the United States.

The debate was intensified by Obama’s decision to nominate his chief counter-terrorism adviser John Brennan, an architect of the drone campaign, as the new director of the CIA.

The Air Force Times said air force chiefs had started posting the drone strikes data last October in an attempt to provide more detail on the use of drones in Afghanistan.

The newspaper said the statistics were provided for November through January, but the February summary released on March 7 had a blank spot where the drone data had previously been listed.

“A variety of multi-role platforms provide ground commanders in Afghanistan with close air support capabilities, and it was determined that presenting the weapons release data as a whole better reflects the air power provided” in Afghanistan, Central Command said in its statement.

“Protecting civilians remains at the very core of AFCENT’s (Air Force Central Command’s) mission,” it said. “The use of all AFCENT aerial weapons are tightly restricted, meticulously planned, carefully supervised and coordinated, and applied by only qualified and authorized personnel.”

The statement said the decision to stop reporting the drone strikes was taken with the International Security Assistance Force – the NATO-led coalition in Afghanistan.

Brennan was sworn into office on Friday following a protracted confirmation battle that saw Senator Rand Paul attempt to block a vote on the nomination with a technical manoeuvre called a filibuster, in which he tried to prevent a vote by talking continuously.

Paul held the Senate floor for more than 12 hours while talking mainly about drones, expressing concern that Obama’s administration might use the aircraft to target U.S. citizens on home soil.

Back in 2009, Joseph S. Nye, Jr. , wrote the following in an article for ForeignPolicy.com:

In her confirmation hearings, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said, “America cannot solve the most pressing problems on our own, and the world cannot solve them without America. . . . We must use what has been called ‘smart power,’ the full range of tools at our disposal.” Since then, editorial pages and blogs have been full of references to “smart power.” But what does it mean?

“Smart power” is a term I developed in 2003 to counter the misperception that soft power alone can produce effective foreign policy. Power is one’s ability to affect the behavior of others to get what one wants. There are three basic ways to do this: coercion, payment, and attraction. Hard power is the use of coercion and payment. Soft power is the ability to obtain preferred outcomes through attraction. If a state can set the agenda for others or shape their preferences, it can save a lot on carrots and sticks. But rarely can it totally replace either. Thus the need for smart strategies that combine the tools of both hard and soft power.

Judging by their appeasement of our enemies, and their total naivete (at least, I hope it’s just naivete) of the Muslim World, Obama and his State Department have Nye’s “Smart Power” down pat. The only problem is, the only things those barbarians understand are strength of will and brute force. Therefore using unmanned drones, instead of traditional Armed Forces, only solidifies their opinion of Obama as a wimp.

Therefore, Karzai and his friends in the Muslim Brotherhood, are not impressed.

God protect us.

Until He Comes, 

KJ

Requiem for a Bad Dog: John McCormack 1955-2011 (2nd Anniversary Edition)

On By kingsjesterIn Christianity, Entertainment1 Comment

Prologue: Today marks the two year anniversary of the death of a Mid-South legend, larger-than-life Radio Personality John “Bad Dog” McCormack.  Here is a tribute which I wrote, upon hearing of his passing.  One man CAN make a difference. He is truly missed.

If, when we’re standing before God, the amount of good we do with our lives, and the amount of joy and happiness that we are able to bring to this world of pain is brought up, then, Thursday afternoon, the Pearly Gates shook with the infectious laughter of one giant of a man.

John “Bad Dog” McCormack lost his long battle with AML late Thursday Afternoon at Methodist University Hospital in his hometown of Memphis, Tennessee.  Bad Dog was an on-air personality for 22 years at WEGR Rock 103, a Classic Rock Station.

Bad Dog began as a part of the Wake-up Crew with Tim Spencer and Bev Hart.  Dog was basically a 14-year-old kid in a man’s body.  He was a natural-born prankster, and became known for his creation of “The Twilight Phone”, an anonymous prank call he would make to unsuspecting citizens.

In one memorable call, he impersonated an Apartment Manager, calling a guy who dumped his fiance’s dead pet Piranhas into the apartment lake, claiming that they came back to life and the poor sap had to reimburse the apartment $2,8000 for draining and restocking the lake.  And then, there was Bad Dog”s possibly most famous call, where he talked to an older gentleman named Mr. Lannum, impersonating a collector attempting to collect on a  past-due cable bill.  Mr. Lannum went ballistic, cussing a blue streak that is still talked of in hushed tones to this day, 20 tears later:

When he finally clued the individuals in to whom they had been talking to, each one of them eventually forgave him, because, after all, it was Bad Dog.

Another routine that Bad Dog came up with, was remarkable.  In a city known for racial polarization, he came up with the idea of numbering their show’s Black listeners, thinking that actual black listeners would be few and far between.  Well, Bad Dog received a big surprise.

The routine became very popular among Memphis’  Black Community, as people called in to talk to Bad Dog.  He would make up a hilarious “oath” for the listener to say, and from then on, whenever this individual would call in to talk about the subject of the day, they would self-identify as Black Listener Number So-and-So.  Everyone loved Bad Dog.

However, the most incredible thing that this man accomplished during his time with us started when he, Spencer, and Hart decided to begin a yearly Radiothon in support of St. Jude Hospital’s Ronald McDonald House.

Over the last 20 years, Bad Dog and his co-workers have raised over $7 million dollars to help build and maintain the refuge for cancer-stricken kids and their families, so they could have some semblance of normal life while they undergo treatment at St. Jude.

Bad Dog McCormack was diagnosed with Acute Myelogenous Leukemia in late October 2009.  He was still working mornings, though his new partner was Ric Chetter.  Clear Channel Communications, in their infinite wisdom, had split up the popular Wake Up Crew in November of 2006, firing Newsperson Bev Hart, and, eventually moving Rock 103 Program Director Tim Spencer to mid-days.

Bad Dog continued to work as he underwent treatment, as he felt that this was the best medicine for him and was what God had called him to do.  His courage in the face of his own mortality was an inspiration to the entire Mid-South, as his barrel-house laugh continued to reverberate through the car speakers of the Mid-South every morning.  He also continued to work the annual Rock103 Radiothon, letting nothing stand in his way of helping the kids.

Bad Dog underwent a bone marrow transplant in November of 2010.  He seemed to be doing better, and, in December, an online poll of Memphians voted him The Most Noteworthy Memphian of the Year.

On February 10-11th, Bad Dog was at the mic, around the clock, for the 20th Annual Rock103 Radiothon.  When it was over, he announced that more Leukemia had been found.  He remained upbeat, and said that this was just par for the course.

Meanwhile, Clear Channel Communications, again in its infinite wisdom, fired Ric Chetter, and moved Bad Dog and Tim Spencer to afternoons, while bringing in a morning show named Free Beer and Hot Wings, 5 guys syndicated out of the Great White North, whose humor about hockey games is about as relevant to the Mid-South as hunting moose. (They have since been pulled from the Memphis Market. Quel suprise!)

Bad Dog took this change in his usual good-natured stride, happy to be back with his old partner-in-crime, Tim.

Then, last Thursday, Bad Dog took a turn for the worse.  He was rushed to Methodist University Hospital in Downtown Memphis, where he passed away from an aneurysm, brought about by his Leukemia.

In an interview with the Commercial Appeal, Bad Dog made this comment about his battle against Leukemia and his love for the kids at St. Jude:

When I see what they are going through, I have no reason to complain. They are so young and have so much pain. I’ve lived a blessed life. If I died tomorrow, I’d go with a smile on my face.

He also, in his usual big-hearted, gentle way, left a statement to be released after his death:

I have gone to be with God and he is holding me tightly and I am surrounded by many of the Ronald McDonald’s House kids. Do not say you have lost a friend… One is only lost when you don’t know where they are… you know where I am. I thank each and every one of you for your support and prayers. I love all of you and that will never go away. When you are having a bad day… think of my laugh or a Twilight phone or the time we met. None of us is guaranteed tomorrow, make every day great, be the spiritual leader of your family. May peace be with you. Your friend, Bad Dog.

John”Bad Dog” McCormack, 55,  leaves behind his two sons, Buck and Tucker, a huge family, and thousands of fans.

As one of those fans, please allow me to say thank you, Bad Dog, for brightening up a lot of dreary mornings.

A sign currently on display outside  a local jewelry store says it all:

BAD DOG MADE MEMPHIS A BETTER PLACE.

Obama Hypocricy: Abu Ghaith and Unmanned Drones

On By kingsjesterIn Politics2 Comments

obamabillofrightsHave you ever thought about where our rights as Americans come from? Are they rights that are common and applicable to every individual born 0n this terrestrial ball? Or, are they unique to those of us, graced by God, with the gift of having been born in the greatest country on the face of His green Earth?

Evidently, President Barack Hussein Obama (mm mmm mmmm) and his Attorney General believe that the previously mentioned rights are universal.

The Obama Administration has captured Abu Ghaith, a Kuwaiti member of Al Qaeda,a member of Osama bin Laden’s family, believe it or not, and, instead of interring him in Gitmo, where he belongs, they have conferred upon this enemy combatant the same rights as you or I, American citizens, have. Obama and Holder have brought him to the United States for a civilian trial in a Manhattan courtroom, ironically, one mile from Ground Zero, where he’s already appeared in court to plead not guilty to charges of conspiracy to kill Americans.

According to Jay Sekulow, Chief Counsel of the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ), in an op ed he has written for foxnews.com,

Enemy combatants should be interrogated relentlessly, not given Miranda warnings.

Enemy combatants shouldn’t be tried in civilian courtrooms in the middle of a densely populated city – creating a much softer target for a spectacular and symbolic terrorist attack than a fortified military base like Guantanamo Bay.

Moreover, if we’re going to make the legal argument at home and abroad that we’re at war, why play right into our critics’ hands by suddenly and arbitrarily treating our war like an episode of “CSI: New York”?

Our enemies, working with their allies on the international left, want America’s hands to be tied, for us to use police methods and – more importantly – police weapons and tactics even while they arm themselves to the teeth and work tirelessly to kill as many Americans as they can.

Already our military is under extreme pressure, even from some of our allies, to adopt a law-enforcement approach even in the conduct of our military operations in Afghanistan.

Our rules of engagement are sometimes so restrictive that they can lead to loss of American life and grant actual battlefield advantages to the Taliban.

While we’re in the midst of an international argument over the law of armed conflict, we just handed our ideological opponents something more than a significant propaganda victory – we handed them a real-life example to use as the foundation for a new “customary international law” that is the form of binding international law created by nations’ actual policies and practices in fighting terror.

In addition, the Obama administration is demonstrating that it exists as an “imperial presidency.” One that is more arbitrary than the Bush administration it so self-righteously criticized. Under this Obama doctrine, the ultimate questions of war and peace, life and death, appear to follow no principle or pattern beyond the administration’s own whims.

This administration has failed to articulate a coherent approach to fighting deadly enemies. It brags about its “kill list” during a presidential campaign, yet after the campaign it doesn’t seem to mind when Egypt denies us access to the Benghazi suspects (by the way – where is the retaliation for that dreadful attack?).

Simply put, Bin Laden family members should not get their day in court in Manhattan.

The distinguished barrister is absolutely correct.

By conferring American rights on a barbaric, murderous, Islamic Terrorist, who would just as soon behead us Infidels as look at us, Obama has given our enemy the right to remain silent, which shuts down our intelligence agencies’ ability to get any information from him which may save American lives in the future.

Not to mention the fact that he is putting the people of New York City in danger from the very same Jihadists who killed over 3,000 in that very same city on that horrible day of September 11, 2001.

Furthermore, the Manchurian President has conferred upon this barbarian, rights and privileges bequeathed to us by our Founding Fathers, in the magnificent document they wrote for us to govern ourselves by, known as the United States Constitution.

In the section which contains the first Ten Amendments to this living and breathing document, known as the Bill of Rights, are the Fifth and Sixth Amendments, it states,

Amendment V

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

Amendment VI

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.

By bestowing upon this murderous Islamic Thug, and those like him, the rights and privileges of the very citizens they are trying to slaughter, Obama and Holder have proven themselves to be the world’s biggest hypocrites.

Because, at the same time they are wrapping these murderous Muslims in a Constitutional blanket of rights, woven by our Founding Fathers, specifically for American citizens, they have been intimating the fact that they plan to violate the Constitutional Rights of actual Americans, by using unmanned drones to hunt them down and kill them on American soil without due process.

Which begs the question: Why are they protecting the rights of our enemies and are so loathe to protect the rights of American citizens, whom they are sworn to protect “from enemies foreign and domestic”?

Anti-American, treasonous, or just plain Impeachable…or all of the above?

Until He Comes,

KJ

The Vichy Republicans Vs. The New Conservatives

On By kingsjesterIn Politics5 Comments

grahamandmccainYesterday, I wrote about Sen. Rand Paul’s 13 hour filibuster he delivered on Wednesday to bring to light President Barack Hussein Obama’s refusal to answer the question of whether he would use unmanned drones to hunt down and kill American Citizens on our soil, and to block the vote on Obama’s nominee for CIA Director, dhimmi John O. Brennan.

Unmanned drones killing American Citizens…sounds like a bad science fiction movie, doesn’t it?

Well, the good news is: He finally received an answer from Attorney General Eric Holder, who wrote him a short message, stating, “No”.

The bad news is: Yesterday morning, Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, fresh from being treated to an outrageously expensive dinner by Obama on the very evening Sen. Paul was delivering his inspiring filibuster, verbally attacked Rand Paul for his efforts. They mocked him and ridiculed him, saying that he “violated the Rules of the Senate”.

The Washington Times reports that

Mr. McCain quoted from a Wall Street Journal editorial: “The country needs more senators who care about liberty, but if Mr. Paul wants to be taken seriously he needs to do more than pull political stunts that fire up impressionable libertarian kids in their college dorms. He needs to know what he’s talking about.”

The senator went on to say that he didn’t “think that what happened yesterday was helpful to the American people.”

And where Democrats praised Mr. Paul for using Senate rules properly to launch a filibuster, Mr. McCain said it was an abuse of rules that could hurt the GOP in the long run.”What we saw yesterday is going to give ammunition to those who say the rules of the Senate are being abused,” the Arizona Republican said.

Mr. Paul said he was filibustering to get the administration to affirm it won’t kill non-combatant Americans in the U.S. — and his effort was joined by more than a dozen other senators who said they, too, supported his effort to get answers.

Mr. Graham said asking whether the president has the power to kill Americans here at home is a ludicrous question.

“I do not believe that question deserves an answer,” Mr. Graham said.

Mr. Graham and Mr. McCain led a Republican delegation that held a private dinner with President Obama on Wednesday, as Mr. Paul was holding the floor with help from other GOP colleagues.

Mr. McCain even joked about Mr. Graham’s “behavior” at the dinner.

“He was on his best manners and everyone was impressed,” Mr. McCain said.

Speaking to reporters after he came off the floor Wednesday, Mr. Graham said he defends Mr. Paul’s right to ask questions and seek answers, but said the filibuster has actually pushed him to now support Mr. Brennan.

Mr. Graham said he had been inclined to oppose the nomination because he’d found Brennan to be qualified for the job but also “arrogant, kind of a bit shifty.” He said he wasn’t going to filibuster him but would have voted against him on final passage, but now he’ll vote for him.

“I am going to vote for Brennan now because it’s become a referendum on the drone program,” he said.

Later in the day, Sen. “Grahamesty” did just that, helping to  bring about the approval of Brennan’s nomination.

Why did “The Sunshine Boys” attack Sen. Paul like that?

Rush Limbaugh, as he always does, had the answer:

It’s just that there’s nobody that we see that has any courage to stand up to the people who are doing the damage. Even when we have the White House, there’s no standing up to the people assaulting the country. Even when we’re campaigning, the candidate doesn’t stand up. Now, I know the president’s race frightens a lot of people away from criticizing him. (No two ways about that. It’s just the way it is.) But Rand Paul did it last night, and nobody’s calling him a racist today. Nobody’s calling him an extremist, and nobody’s calling him names — and he doesn’t care anyway.

But he [Sen. Rand Paul] stood up for freedom. Last night people finally had somebody to rally around. Somebody finally spoke up and reflected what you all think and what you all fear. And somebody, in addition to speaking up, was actually trying to put the brakes on the direction this country’s being taken. So, yeah, it made perfect sense for people to rally behind it and rally to it. And then today after that we get the old guard, the ruling class, Republican establishment types belittling what happened last night. Casting it aside. It’s insignificant. Violated the rules of the Senate. Bad image. Silly to say that the president wants to launch drone strikes on America. Why do we even have to answer that question. That’s so absurd, it’s silly. Why, it was embarrassing last night.

…You cannot have this many millions of Americans continually ignored and unrepresented in a representative democracy without a price to pay for it.

So Rand Paul does his filibuster, and people flock to it. Even Democrats flocked to it, all over Twitter, which is normally owned, run, and operated by the Democrats. All over Twitter last night, Rand Paul had people saying, “Well, wait a minute, I understand this.” I mean, the left, this should be a natural for them. This is the kind of stuff, this is why Code Pink exists, for example, among other things.

The administration ought to be just taking it on the chin over this. And they may be. Time will tell. My whole point here is I understand why people are rallying to Rand Paul and Rubio and Ted Cruz. And that’s going to continue. And the Republican establishment, as long as they continue to pretend this is 1990, ’98, 2000, as long as the old rules which guarantee defeat continue to dominate, then at some point something’s gotta give.

Rush is right, as usual.

Sen. Graham actually made the arrangements for the swanky meal, enjoyed by 12 Republican Senators Wednesday Night, which was hosted and paid for by Obama (which means you and I actually footed the bill). For them to be snuggling with the Manchurian President, while Rand Paul and others held the Senate Floor in defense of our Constitution, is despicable. Their love for their Capital Hill way of life took precedence over their service to their constituents and their Constitutional Duty.

McCain and Graham attacking Rand Paul reminded me of “Blazing Saddles”:

We must protect our phony baloney jobs, gentlemen! Hrumph!

The greatest U.S. President of our Generation, Ronald Wilson Reagan, once said,

Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same.

Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, and other “New Conservatives” seem to be willing to do just that.

If the old guard Vichy Republicans care more about their Capitol Hill way of life than their country and their constituents, then it is time for them to get out of the way, and allow Sen. Paul, and his allies to lead the battle against this corrupt anti-American Administration.

Because, as the old saying goes,

If you are not part of the solution, you are part of the problem.

Until He Comes,

KJ