The Shutdown: The Million Vet March

veterans marchYesterday was a very special day in this country. Our Brightest and Best, along with other Patriotic Americans, including Former Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin, and Senators Ted Cruz and Mike Lee, gathered for a celebration of American Freedom, and a protest against tyranny.

Per foxnews.com…

Veterans marched on Sunday in Washington in protest of the partial government shutdown that has kept them and other Americans from visiting war memorials across the country, with support from several star conservatives.

“This is the people’s memorial,” Texas Sen. Ted Cruz told a crowd of several hundred gathered near the WWII Memorial on the closed National Mall, which has become a national symbol of the shutdown and the country’s response. “Simple question: Why is the federal government spending money to keep veterans out of the memorial? Why did they spend money to keep people out of Mount Vernon, Mount Rushmore? Our veterans should be above political games.”

Veterans, including many in wheelchairs, took down police barricades and entered the memorial at about midday as others took the protest to the edge of the White House South Lawn.

“Today somebody’s wife [or] husband is dead in Afghanistan. Is somebody going to pay her husband [or] his wife or their children?” one protester shouted at the White House, referring to the partial shutdown cutting off benefits for the survivors of military personnel.

Some of the metal barricades were carried the roughly half-mile walk from the memorial to the White House, where they were left near the fence in front of Pennsylvania Avenue.

A man was arrested at the event in connection with bringing at least one gun in a bag.

A witness named Jacob Reed told Fox News the man was standing in line to talk to Washington Republican Rep. David G. Reichert.

Reed said a police officer asked the man what he was doing, then asked him to take his bag off his back. The man complied and said the bag contained a bunch of firearms, at which point he was handcuffed and taken into custody.

Cruz was joined by 2008 GOP vice presidential nominee and former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, on a gray, rainy day in the nation’s capital.

“Veterans have proven they are not timid. And we will not be timid in calling out anybody that uses the military as pawns,” Palin told the crowd assembled at the Million Vet March on Memorials. “We can only be America, home of the free, if we are America, home of the brave.”

Protesters shouting “U.S.A.” and “Tear down these walls” put the blame squarely on President Obama and Democratic congressional leaders.

“In a mean-spirited fit of selfish anger, Barack Obama has shut down our nation’s war memorials,” march organizers said in a press release. “And he has declared open war on our honored veterans. The World War II memorial, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, the Korean War Veterans Memorial, Obama has shut them all down to force his will on the House of Representatives and, frankly, to get revenge on the American people who oppose ObamaCare and his other naked power grabs.”

As America’s Veterans were exercising their Constitutional Rights, where was the Commander-in-Chief? Was he negotiating with Republicans to end the Government Shutdown? Did he go outside to address the tumultuous crowd outside his front door?

Oh, heck no.

According to reuters.com…

Just before noon, the White House gave the pool of reporters and photographers who travel with the president notice that it would be highly unlikely that Obama would leave the White House or speak publicly for the rest of the day.

Senator Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader, was slated to hold talks on Sunday with his Republican counterpart, Mitch McConnell, about how much to raise the debt ceiling, and how to end the ongoing government shutdown, now in its 13th day.

Obama made a series of high-profile public appearances during the early days of the shutdown, where he sought to blame Republicans for the fiscal impasse.

But Obama has stayed away from television cameras since he began meeting with lawmakers on Wednesday afternoon.

Vice President Joe Biden, who has close relationships with lawmakers who he served with during his long service in the U.S. Senate, also has stayed out of the public eye.

Biden’s schedule for the weekend showed that he and his wife Jill Biden would spend time at Camp David, the presidential retreat in rural Maryland.

“Maybe we need to get Joe Biden out of the witness protection program,” Republican Senator John McCain said on CBS Television’s “Face the Nation” program on Sunday morning, alluding to Biden’s legendary ability to clinch deals with Republicans.

Obama’s favorite President, Abraham Lincoln, had an Open Door Policy at the White House. Obama has just the opposite. Using the Sequester as an excuse, he stopped all public tours of the White House. However, that has not stopped him from entertaining lobbyists and friends, including the Muslim Brotherhood.

The protesters yesterday were met by Park Rangers in riot gear, mounted police, and helicopters, with armed men hanging off of the sides.

It was rumored that one of those helicopters took Obama away from the White House, in flight from the American Citizens he is supposed to be serving.

Obama’s punitive measures which he has unnecessarily taken against American Citizens, under the guise of the Government Shutdown, are the reason for the march, yesterday.

If Obama was in any hurry to undo these actions, he would have entered into negotiations with the Republicans to end the Shutdown.

However, being the petulant man-child that he is, he is not finished with his temper tantrum, yet.

Thanks to a bunch of American Heroes,though, he has some “Barry-cades” outside his front door to build a playpen with.

Until He Comes,

KJ

The Shutdown: Still…”A Time for Choosing”

reaganI really did not know what to write about today. Like the rest of you, I am getting sick and tired of the self-serving politicians, up in the Halls of Power, acting like a bunch of spoiled children choosing sides for a kickball team.

Our petulant President, while remaining in the middle of a now 13-day-long Temper Tantrum, wants everything his way, refusing to negotiate, because those eeeevil Republicans won’t bow down and kiss his Imperial Hindquarters, as the Vichy “Moderates” among them usually do.

Give them a couple of days. Paul Ryan is working on it, even now.

Anyway, my mind traveled back, as it often does, to a seminal moment in our nation’s history, which might give us guidance in a situation like this.

I found an appropriate message in the words of the greatest President in our Generation, Ronald Wilson Reagan.,delivered on a legendary night in 1964, as he was out delivering stump speeches for the Republican Presidential Campaign of Barry Goldwater. The title of the speech is “A Time For Choosing”, and The Gipper’s words ring as true today, as they ever have…

It’s time we asked ourselves if we still know the freedoms intended for us by the Founding Fathers. James Madison said, “We base all our experiments on the capacity of mankind for self government.”

This idea — that government was beholden to the people, that it had no other source of power — is still the newest, most unique idea in all the long history of man’s relation to man. This is the issue of this election: Whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American Revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capital can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves.

You and I are told we must choose between a left or right, but I suggest there is no such thing as a left or right. There is only an up or down. Up to man’s age-old dream–the maximum of individual freedom consistent with order — or down to the ant heap of totalitarianism. Regardless of their sincerity, their humanitarian motives, those who would sacrifice freedom for security have embarked on this downward path. Plutarch warned, “The real destroyer of the liberties of the people is he who spreads among them bounties, donations and benefits.”

The Founding Fathers knew a government can’t control the economy without controlling people. And they knew when a government sets out to do that, it must use force and coercion to achieve its purpose. So we have come to a time for choosing.

Public servants say, always with the best of intentions, “What greater service we could render if only we had a little more money and a little more power.” But the truth is that outside of its legitimate function, government does nothing as well or as economically as the private sector.

Yet any time you and I question the schemes of the do-gooders, we’re denounced as being opposed to their humanitarian goals. It seems impossible to legitimately debate their solutions with the assumption that all of us share the desire to help the less fortunate. They tell us we’re always “against,” never “for” anything.

…Are you willing to spend time studying the issues, making yourself aware, and then conveying that information to family and friends? Will you resist the temptation to get a government handout for your community? Realize that the doctor’s fight against socialized medicine is your fight. We can’t socialize the doctors without socializing the patients. Recognize that government invasion of public power is eventually an assault upon your own business. If some among you fear taking a stand because you are afraid of reprisals from customers, clients, or even government, recognize that you are just feeding the crocodile hoping he’ll eat you last.

If all of this seems like a great deal of trouble, think what’s at stake. We are faced with the most evil enemy mankind has known in his long climb from the swamp to the stars. There can be no security anywhere in the free world if there is no fiscal and economic stability within the United States. Those who ask us to trade our freedom for the soup kitchen of the welfare state are architects of a policy of accommodation.

They say the world has become too complex for simple answers. They are wrong. There are no easy answers, but there are simple answers. We must have the courage to do what we know is morally right. Winston Churchill said that “the destiny of man is not measured by material computation. When great forces are on the move in the world, we learn we are spirits–not animals.” And he said, “There is something going on in time and space, and beyond time and space, which, whether we like it or not, spells duty.”

You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we will sentence them to take the first step into a thousand years of darkness. If we fail, at least let our children and our children’s children say of us we justified our brief moment here. We did all that could be done.

Today, as we watch our nation’s Veterans, who sacrificed for this great nation, visit the memorials built in their honor, closed right now by the order of a Petulant  President, in the middle of a Temper Tantrum, think about the words of The Great Communicator, who also said, 

Man is not free unless government is limited.

Call your Republican Representatives and tell them, in the words Scotsman William Wallace, to “Hold that Line!” against this present-day tyranny which America is suffering under.

Remind them that our Freedom and their jobs depend on it.

Until He Comes,

KJ

The Shutdown : “A Republic, If You Can Keep it.”

obamaiwojimaAs I, and other Conservative Bloggers, have been reporting all week, there is a struggle going on in the Halls of Power in Washington, DC. It is a struggle for the future of the greatest country on the face of God’s green Earth.

It is a struggle which began the moment that a group of brave Christians, pariahs in their own country, persecuted because of their desire to worship their God, in the manner in which they wanted to, landed on the shores of a vast wilderness, determined to secure their God-Given Freedom, for themselves and their progeny.

Their quest for freedom from a tyrannical Despot led to civil disobedience…and then, war.

Once they had won their Freedom, and formed their new nation, our Founding Fathers set upon the task of putting quill to paper, creating a Constitution, stating for all the world to know, the rights, given to them by their Creator, which they would put in place as the guidelines upon which they would carry this new nation to its destiny.

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.

What we have been witnessing this past week, Americans, is, another attempt to take away the Freedom, which our Founding Fathers, and each succeeding generation, have fought so hard to protect, to the point of sacrificing their lives for it.

That’s why Americans are now focused on the Government Shutdown. For the majority of Americans, living in the Heartland of America, it is not about the present-day “benevolence” of the Federal Government being in danger, by the Government’s doors being closed.

It’s much more important than that.

It is an attempt, by a self-serving, out-of-control President and his Administration, to impose restrictions on our American Freedom.

The flash-point, which caught average Americans’ attention, was the shutting down of our National Monuments, including those who are privately funded. An act which has never been perpetrated before, during previous Government Shutdowns.

Make no mistake. These closings are designed to bring inconvenience and emotional pain to Americans, in order to gain sympathy for the present Presidential Administration’s Political Position.

As an angry Park Service Ranger explained,

We’ve been told to make life as difficult for people as we can. It’s disgusting.

Indeed.

This is not the first time that Government Services have been shutdown during budget battles. That is simply a by-product of holding the feet of the “Public Servants”, who are supposed to represent us, and not themselves, to the fire of fiscal responsibility.

However, this time is different.

This is nothing less than a struggle to retain our Constitutional Republic, or, replace with a Central Government-run, Democrat Socialist, European-style nation, where fiscal responsibility is thrown out the window (think Greece) and the Christian Faith of Our Founders, upon which this blessed country was formed, is regulated in practice to Sunday Mornings from 10:00 a.m. to Noon.

This struggle came into focus for even Low Information Voters, the moment that a group of octogenarian American heroes, members of the Greatest Generation, with the help of their elected Representatives, busted down the barriers to THEIR Memorial, reminding all of us that our American Freedom is still worth fighting for.

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 late Father, and those American Heroes we witnessed make their final charge against tyranny earlier this week, knew all too well…

It is 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

Senator Ted Cruz: Filibustering for Freedom

Ted-Cruz-filibuster-SeussWe’re going to be gifted with a health care plan we are forced to purchase and fined if we don’t, which purportedly covers at least 10 million more people without adding a single new doctor, but provides for 16,000 new IRS agents written by a committee whose chairman says he doesn’t understand it, passed by a Congress that didn’t read it, but exempted themselves from it, and signed by a president who smokes … same sentence … with funding administered by a treasury chief who didn’t pay his taxes, for which we will be taxed for four years before any benefits take effect by the government, which has already bankrupted Social Security and Medicare — all to be overseen by a Surgeon General who is obese, and financed by a country that’s broke.” – Dr. Barbara Ruth Bellar

As I write this post, Senator Ted Cruz, along with help for a few of his colleagues is holding the Senate Floor, speaking against the ruination of the finest Healthcare System in the world, under the monstrosity known as Obamacare, which is scheduled to begin October 1st..

To summarize where we are at…

The freshman senator took the floor Tuesday afternoon promising to speak “until I am no longer able to stand” and his effort continued overnight, usually with just two other senators with him in the Senate chamber.

By 5 a.m. Wednesday, the length of Cruz’s marathon discourse had surpassed more traditional talking filibusters delivered by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) in March and a roughly 14-hour filibuster delivered by the late Sen. Robert C. Byrd (D-W. Va.) in 1964.

As he outlined his opposition to the health-care law, Cruz’s hours of oratory touched a broad mix of subjects and sources, ranging from lyrics from a song by country music star Toby Keith; excerpts from the book, “Atlas Shrugged,” a favorite of libertarians; quotations from the popular reality television show, “Duck Dynasty;” the unemployment rate among African American teenagers; how his father, Rafael Cruz, used to make green eggs and ham for breakfast; a recent acceptance speech by actor Ashton Kutcher at an awards show; and the restaurants Denny’s, Benihana and White Castle.

At one point Tuesday night, Cruz opted to read bedtime stories to his two young daughters, who he said were home in Texas watching television with his wife. Cruz first read “King Solomon’s Wise Words,” from the Book of Proverbs and then the Dr. Seuss classic, “Green Eggs and Ham,” saying that it was one of his favorite children’s books.

Several times Cruz read supportive messages sent to his office via Twitter. He frequently noted that James P. Hoffa, president of the Teamsters Union, has warned that the new health-care law may create “nightmare scenarios” for employers.

If Hoffa is correct, then Cruz said that “senators shouldn’t be asleep when the nation is undergoing a nightmare.”

Several like-minded Senate conservatives briefly joined Cruz for a time on the Senate floor Tuesday evening, including Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.), two 2016 presidential aspirants. Cruz could yield to colleagues for long-form questions but could not leave the floor or sit.

His most frequent partner was Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), who would offer the Texas senator a respite by speaking at times for almost an hour.

President Barack Hussein Obama (mm mmm mmmm) and Former President William Jefferson Clinton(Bubba, to you and me) spoke out against his efforts yesterday:

During an informal discussion at a Clinton Global Initiative Forum in New York City, Obama and former President Bill Clinton focused mostly on the policy details of the law, with the current commander in chief warning that Republicans have tried to “scare” people into declining to get health care coverage.

“You’ve had is an unprecedented effort that you’ve seen ramp up in the past month or so that those who have opposed the idea of universal health care in the first place — and have fought this thing tooth and nail through Congress and through the courts — trying to scare and discourage people from getting a good deal,” Obama said.

Acknowledging the unpopularity of some of the bill’s requirements, Obama said the Affordable Care Act’s mandates on businesses and individuals are integral to a working and fair system.

“People generally don’t like to be told you’ve to get health insurance. And employers don’t like to be told you’ve got to give your employees health insurance,” Obama said. “But as a society what we cannot do is to say you have no responsibilities whatsoever but you’ve got guaranteed coverage.”

Democrats are pushing to publicize the benefits of the new law before open enrollment begins on October 1. Some Republicans have tied a bill to keep the government running to a measure defunding the health care law’s implementation, making the possibility of a government shutdown loom.

As gallant an effort as this is, by this wonderful public servant, the only ones listening to him, are those few colleagues I mentioned…and the American People. The Liberal, socialistic Democrats and their allies, the Vichy Republicans, like John “Juan McAmnesty” McCain and his pet dog Lindsey “Tiddie” Graham, refused to “sully their hands” and listen as Sen. Cruz pleaded for the future of this Republic.

They forgot long ago that they were elected to be OUR voice in Washington. Now, they only speak for themselves, their lobbyists, and an agenda based upon the failed teachings of Karl Marx.

Sen. Cruz is a breath of fresh air. Capra-esque, in fact, and highly reminiscent of the indefatigable Jefferson Smith, in Capra’s classic “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington”. Smith (the late, great Jimmy Stewart) says the following as he’s delivering his filibuster:

Just get up off the ground, that’s all I ask. Get up there with that lady that’s up on top of this Capitol dome, that lady that stands for liberty. Take a look at this country through her eyes if you really want to see something. And you won’t just see scenery; you’ll see the whole parade of what Man’s carved out for himself, after centuries of fighting. Fighting for something better than just jungle law, fighting so’s he can stand on his own two feet, free and decent, like he was created, no matter what his race, color, or creed. That’s what you’d see. There’s no place out there for graft, or greed, or lies, or compromise with human liberties.

And that, when you get down to it, is what Senator Ted Cruz has been speaking about, since Tuesday afternoon: LIBERTY.

Our American Freedom was endowed by OUR CREATOR. Obamacare is simply a step toward a totalitarian regime taking it away.

Until He Comes,

KJ

Freedom…What a Concept.

American FreedomIn yesterday’s post, I touched on how the word “Freedom” is misunderstood.

The words “Freedom” and “Liberty” are intertwined…similar offspring from one Father…the Father of Man.

As as 54 year old, I was privileged to cast my first-ever vote for Ronald Wilson Reagan, the greatest President of the United States of my generation. He 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.

One reason that President Reagan was so beloved by my generation was the fact that he dared to espouse the same beliefs, secular and sacred, which our Founding Fathers held so dear.

Especially, their beliefs concerning this unique gift of God, known as American Freedom.

Benjamin Franklin said,

Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters.

What Dr. Franklin was talking about is the fact, as you’ve seen me state time and time again, that with Freedom comes Responsibility. Our actions have a direct effect on those around us.

Furthermore, man is a corrupt animal. Every child learns how to lie, at an early age. That is why we are told as parents to “raise a child in the way in which they should go”.

And, as those of us my age have observed, in the last couple of generations, there are less parents heeding that admonition from God’s Word.

Walk into any Walmart across America, and observe the behavior of children and their parents. It have become almost impossible to walk though a Walmart without almost running over a kid. And, please don’t stand there and wait for an apology from the mother of the “precious darling”, those come few and far between.

To be bold, a lot of these undisciplined children, grow up to be young adults, who seem to be allergic to responsibility. These are the ones, who, after college, refuse to leave home. Like the movie title, they experience a “Failure to Launch”.

Their every breathing moment is a quest for self-fulfillment, and an all-consuming involvement in a love affair…with themselves.

This selfishness guides their political ideology, as well. Usually these individuals become, either Liberals, or, they identify themselves as Libertarians. Those who identify themselves as Liberals, believe that their intellect is innately higher than the rest of us, and, therefore, they should be able to be the Elite Class, political party in charge of our nation. Those who choose to identify themselves as Libertarians, claim to believe in Fiscal Conservatism, and  Social Liberalism.

There is also a different sort of Libertarian in America….those who believe in the Constitution and the liberty of the individual. Those “Constitutionalists” are not the ones to whom I am referring.

Where the problem arises is the fact that Liberalism, Libertarian. and Libertine all share the same root word “lib”, which means “free”. The word “Liberty” contains that word, also.

The problem is, “Freedom” or “Liberty” without conscience, is licentiousness. And, unrestricted  licentiousness will destroy an empire.

If man is left to his own devices, he usually builds his own Golden Calf.

And, I am afraid that is what has happened in this sacred land.

Dr. Franklin once wrote,

I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth, that God governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without his aid? We have been assured, Sir, in the Sacred Writings, that “except the Lord build the House, they labor in vain that build it.” I firmly believe this; and I also believe that without His concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better, than the Builders of Babel: We shall be divided by our partial local interests; our projects will be confounded, and we ourselves shall become a reproach and bye word down to future ages. And what is worse, mankind may hereafter from this unfortunate instance, despair of establishing governments by human wisdom and leave it to chance, war and conquest.

Just the other day, in Texas, a group of Pro-life Protesters, standing outside the Capitol, where a bill calling for restrictions on third trimester abortions was being discussed, suddenly started singing the great American Hymn, “Amazing Grace”. Once they began, Pro-Abortion counter-protesters started chanted “Hail Satan! and “Jesus should have been aborted!”.

Now, I have seen Liberals on Conservative websites claim those horrible chants were just a feeble attempt to drown out the Pro-Lifers.  I asked a Liberal, who wrote such an excuse, if he would be able to chant those words in a public square.

I never got an answer.

Would you, as an average American, be able to say something that blasphemous in public? Probably not.

My love for the Savior prevents me from even thinking them.

The point of my post is, while my generation and the majority of Americans, I believe, still recognize that Divine Spark that led to the birth of our American Freedom, we have those among us, who would rather fulfill their own selfish desires than be held accountable for their actions by their fellow man or a Divine Power. They proclaim American Exceptionalism, however, they do not seem to wish to participate in it. In fact, they seem to be quite content to watch the “shining city on a hill” be “radically changed” into North Korea or Venezuela, while, socially, coming down on the very same side of important national issues, as the Liberals they claim to oppose.

President Reagan once said,

Freedom prospers when religion is vibrant and the rule of law under God is acknowledged.

Perhaps, that is the reason we find ourselves as a nation, struggling so mightily to stay free.

Until He Comes,

KJ

July 4, 2013: Through the Night With a Light From Above.

WashingtonPrayingMy country tis of thee,

Sweet land of liberty,

Of thee I sing.

Land where my fathers died!

Land of the Pilgrim’s pride!

From every mountain side,

Let freedom ring!

Like many of you, I have been watching events unfold halfway across the globe in the streets of Egypt.  Egypt’s President Morsi, and his fellow travelers in the Muslim Brotherhood, have been tossed out on their ears by their opposition in the last election, aided by the Egyptian Military. The world witnessed a remarkable scene the other day, as one third of that ancient nation took to the streets to march for their freedom from oppression, in a scene reminiscent of Moses leading the Jewish people out of bondage, all those centuries ago.

237 years ago today, our forefathers declared their freedom from oppression, too.

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

Freedom. What a unique, yet, misunderstood word. What is Freedom? It is the ability to do whatever one wishes, regardless of the consequences to those around us, including family and friends?

NO. That would be licentiousness, debauchery, or simply being a libertine.

So, how do we define our American Freedom?

I believe our American Freedom is a unique gift from God.

Our forefathers braved harsh ocean voyages, only to then have to endure miserable living conditions, including savage Indians, exposure to the elements, and disease, in order to secure Freedom to worship God as they wished.

Our Freedom, or Liberty, if you will, springs not from self-centered lustful desires, but a desire to make a better life for ourselves, our family, and those who follow behind us. Our Liberty is an expression of our human hearts which springs from a Divine Origin.

Our Founders understood the dangers they faced when the set out to this sacred land. Their’s was a voyage of faith, a journey of hope, full of joyous anticipation at what their new home would be like and what their new life would be like.

When they got here and began to forge their new lives, they soon found themselves to still be under the oppressive rule of King George III.

They choice they made to declare their independence was not an easy one, and the war to achieve their freedom cost many lives and much sacrifice.

Personal Sacrifice was accepted by these Freedom Fighters with no questions asked.  Sacrifices were made to secure their freedom…and ours.

Those citizen soldiers understood that with Freedom comes Responsibility…a responsibility to the idea of Freedom, to their fellow “Americans”, and to prosperity. They knew this was a serious decision. They also knew by Whom’s Grace they would gain their freedom…

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

Present-day America is in the middle of our own struggle for freedom. Our present Administration has been attacking the freedoms which our forefathers promised us in our nation’s Constitution, precious freedoms which our nations Best and Brightest have fought and died to protect.

Licentiousness and self-centerness revolving around relative morality and situational ethics are our nation’s cultural norms. Or, at least that is what our Administration and their sycophants in the Main Stream Media try to sell us every day.

Some of our citizens will tell you that as long as your behavior “doesn’t hurt anybody”, you can do whatever you want, in the name of Liberty, redefining the meaning of a word which our Founders pledged their sacred honor to defend to the death.

America’s populace is still struggling through the worst economic situation our country has seen since the Great Depression.  Approximately 20% of our countrymen are unemployed, underemployed, or have just plain given up.  One-sixth of our nation has to rely on assistance from our government just to have food on the table, while remaining under the governance of a president who worships a Far Left political ideology steeped in the redistribution of wealth teachings of Karl Marx and Saul Alinsky.

Americans have watched, feeling helpless, as he and his self-centered minions in Congress took our tax dollars and spent all of it and then some, as if there was no tomorrow, leaving our children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren with a debt that this shining city on a hill may never recover from.

Meanwhile, those whom we have elected to serve us, are serving themselves, by trying to create new voters from those who have entered our country illegally.

While, at the same time, Americans are protesting to keep their perceived “right” to murder the unborn, denying them the chance to vote…and to live, while shouting “Hail Satan!” and “Jesus should have been aborted”.

We have watched, with our mouths hanging wide open, as the President of the United States and his State Department, have reached out to embrace and fund the very barbarians that want to murder each and every one of us, while at the same time, criticizing and alienating our closest allies.

For example, yesterday, the “Leader of the Free World” pledged his continued support for the ousted Egyptian President and the Grandfather of Islamic Terrorist Organizations, the Muslim Brotherhood.

Now, I’m just spitballin’ here…but, shouldn’t the President of the United States of America be standing for Freedom, not for Oppression?

Shouldn’t he be protecting us from our sworn enemies, not inviting them to OUR White House and hugging their necks?

Shouldn’t we be allowed in OUR OWN HOUSE?

Our nation is experiencing a very dark time.

In such a dark time as this, the words of the great, classic Patriot Anthem, written by the legendary Irving Berlin, which made the late, great songstress, Kate Smith famous, shine through as a beacon of hope…and a fervent prayer to Our Creator…

While the storm clouds gather far across the sea,

Let us swear allegiance to a land that’s free.

Let us all be grateful for a land so fair,

As we raise our voices in a solemn prayer:

God bless america, land that I love,

Stand beside her and guide her

Through the night with a light from above.

From the mountains, to the prairies,

To the oceans white with foam,

God bless america,

My home sweet home.

Happy 4th of July, Americans!

God bless us…everyone!

Until He Comes,

KJ

The Brandenburg Gate: A Tale of Two Speeches

reaganThe following remarks are an excerpt from the “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall” speech given at the Brandenburg Gate in West Berlin, Germany on June 12, 1987 by President Ronald Wilson Reagan…

In these four decades, as I have said, you Berliners have built a great city. You’ve done so in spite of threats–the Soviet attempts to impose the East-mark, the blockade. Today the city thrives in spite of the challenges implicit in the very presence of this wall. What keeps you here?

Certainly there’s a great deal to be said for your fortitude, for your defiant courage. But I believe there’s something deeper, something that involves Berlin’s whole look and feel and way of life– not mere sentiment. No one could live long in Berlin without being completely disabused of illusions. Something instead, that has seen the difficulties of life in Berlin but chose to accept them, that continues to build this good and proud city in contrast to a surrounding totalitarian presence that refuses to release human energies or aspirations. Something that speaks with a powerful voice of affirmation, that says yes to this city, yes to the future, yes to freedom. In a word, I would submit that what keeps you in Berlin is love–love both profound and abiding.

Perhaps this gets to the root of the matter, to the most fundamental distinction of all between East and West. The totalitarian world produces backwardness because it does such violence to the spirit, thwarting the human impulse to create, to enjoy, to worship. The totalitarian world finds even symbols of love and of worship an affront. Years ago, before the East Germans began rebuilding their churches, they erected a secular structure: the television tower at Alexander Platz. Virtually ever since, the authorities have been working to correct what they view as the tower’s one major flaw, treating the glass sphere at the top with paints and chemicals of every kind. Yet even today when the Sun strikes that sphere–that sphere that towers over all Berlin– the light makes the sign of the cross. There in Berlin, like the city itself, symbols of love, symbols of worship, cannot be suppressed. As I looked out a moment ago from the Reichstag, that embodiment of German unity, I noticed words crudely spray-painted upon the wall, perhaps by a young Berliner, “This wall will fall.

Beliefs become reality.” Yes, across Europe, this wall will fall. For it cannot withstand faith; it cannot withstand truth. The wall cannot withstand freedom.

And I would like, before I close, to say one word. I have read, and I have been questioned since I’ve been here about certain demonstrations against my coming. And I would like to say just one thing, and to those who demonstrate so. I wonder if they have ever asked themselves that if they should have the kind of government they apparently seek, no one would ever be able to do what they’re doing again.

Thank you and God bless you all.

Yesterday, our current president spoke at the same location, before a sparse crowd of 4,500. During his world-wide campaign to become United States President in 2008, he spoke before an adoring throng of 200,000.

I do believe that, like the majority of Americans, Europeans have caught on to our Prevaricator-in Chief.

Compare the following excerpt of Obama’s speech, to President Reagan’s.

Peace with justice means pursuing the security of a world without nuclear weapons, no matter how distant that dream may be. And so as president, I’ve strengthened our efforts to stop the spread of nuclear weapons and reduce the number and role of America’s nuclear weapons. Because of the New START Treaty, we’re on track to cut American and Russian deployed nuclear warheads to their lowest levels since the 1950s.

But we have more work to do. So today, I’m announcing additional steps forward. After a comprehensive review, I’ve determined that we can ensure the security of America and our allies-and maintain a strong and credible strategic deterrent-while reducing our deployed strategic nuclear weapons by up to one-third. And I intend to seek negotiated cuts with Russia to move beyond Cold War nuclear postures.

At the same time, we’ll work with our NATO allies to seek bold reductions in U.S. and Russian tactical weapons in Europe. And we can forge a new international framework for peaceful nuclear power, reject the nuclear weaponization that North Korea and Iran may be seeking.

America will host a summit in 2016 to continue our efforts to secure nuclear materials around the world, and we will work to build support in the United States to ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty and call on all nations to begin negotiations on a treaty that ends the production of fissile materials for nuclear weapons.

These are steps we can take to create a world of peace with justice.

Peace with justice means refusing to condemn our children to a harsher, less hospitable planet. The efforts to slow climate change requires bold action, and on this, Germany and Europe have led. In the United States, we have recently doubled our renewable energy from clean sources, like wind and solar power. We’re doubling fuel efficiency on our cars. Our dangerous carbon emissions have come down, but we know we have to do more. And we will do more.

With a global middle class consuming more energy every day, this must now be an effort of all nations, not just some, for the grim alternative affects all nations: more severe storms, more famine and floods, new waves of refugees, coast lines that vanish, oceans that rise.

This is the future we must avert. This is the global threat of our time. And for the sake of future generations, our generation must move toward a global compact to confront a changing climate before it is too late. That is our job. That is our task.

We have to get to work.

Peace with justice means meeting our moral obligations. And we have a moral obligation and a profound interest in helping lift the impoverished corners of the world by promoting growth so we spare a child born today a lifetime of extreme poverty; by investing in agriculture, so we aren’t just sending food, but also teaching farmers to grow food; by strengthening public health so we’re not just sending medicine, but training doctors and nurses who will help end the outrage of children dying from preventable diseases; making sure that we do everything we can to realize the promise, an achievable promise of the first AIDs-free generation. That is something that is possible if we feel a sufficient sense of urgency.

Our efforts have to be about more than just charity. They’re about new models of empowering people, to build institutions, to abandon the rot of corruption, to-create ties of trade, not just aid, both with the West and among the nations that are seeking to rise and increase their capacity. Because when they succeed, we will be more successful as well. Our fates are linked. We cannot ignore those who are yearning, not only for freedom, but also prosperity.

And, finally, let’s remember that peace with justice depends on our ability to sustain both the security of our societies and the openness that defines them. Now, threats to freedom don’t merely come from the outside. They can emerge from within, from our own fears, from the disengagement of our citizens. For over a decade, America’s been at war. Yet much has now changed over the five years since I last spoke here in Berlin. The Iraq war is now over. The Afghan war is coming to an end. Osama bin Laden is no more. Our efforts against Al Qaida…

… are evolving. And, given these changes, last month I spoke about America’s efforts against terrorism. And I drew inspiration from one of our founding fathers, James Madison, who wrote, “No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.” James Madison is right, which is why even as we remain vigilant about the threat of terrorism, we must move beyond the mind-set of perpetual war.

And in America, that means redoubling our efforts to close the prison at Guantanamo.

During that speech, Obama quoted President Kennedy, who said, during his  “Ich bin ein Berliner” Speech,

Let me ask you to lift your eyes beyond the dangers of today and beyond the freedom of merely this city. Look to the day of peace with justice, beyond yourselves and ourselves to all mankind.

Translation:

Pay no attention to that Muslim with the bomb strapped around his waist. We’ll just talk nicely to him, and he’ll stop. Or, we’ll arrest him and give him a fair trial by a jury of his peers. We are the world. We are the people. It’s true we make a better place…just you and me.

Obama’s Pollyanna b.s. aside, why does this Kenyan Kaiser have to run down America, every place he speaks? Why does he have to insult us? Is he embarrassed by American Exceptionalism?

It is only through American Exceptionalism, (and his anonymous puppet masters) that his less-that-brilliant rear got to attend Harvard, where he became the only Editor of the Harvard Law Review never to publish a single paper.

Regarding his sketchy history and “record of achievement”…he didn’t build that.

Reagan spoke of America as “a Shining City on a Hill”. Obama speaks of us as “just another country”.

Reagan spoke of courage, freedom, the power of the individual, and liberty. Obama speaks about “shared sacrifice”.

Reagan said, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!” …and he did it. Obama said, “I’m going to close down Gitmo!” And, it remains open.

Reagan loved his country. Obama loves the rest of the world more.

And, that is why he is failing as the President of the greatest country on the face of God’s green Earth.

Until He Comes,

KJ

Operation Prism: He Knows When You’ve Been Bad or Good…or Vote Democrat.

ObamalyingThis week, Americans have found out that their President authorized unlimited surveillance on innocent citizens, gathering data from our cell phones, credit cards, and computers, both at home and at work.

And, according to someone who would know, we ain’t seen nothing, yet:

The National Security Agency’s collection of phone data from all of Verizon’s U.S. customers is just the “tip of the iceberg,” says a former NSA official who estimates the agency has data on as many as 20 trillion phone calls and emails by U.S. citizens.

William Binney, an award-winning mathematician and noted NSA whistleblower, says the collection dates back to when the super-secret agency began domestic surveillance after the Sept. 11 attacks.

“I believe they’ve been collecting data about all domestic calls since October 2001,” said Mr. Binney, who worked at NSA for more than 30 years. “That’s more than a billion calls a day.”

He called his figures “back of the envelope” estimates, adding that they include emails as well as telephone calls.

Marc Ambinder, writing for The Week, posted the following information in an article published June 6th:

Analysts at the National Security Agency can now secretly access real-time user data provided by as many as 50 American companies, ranging from credit rating agencies to internet service providers, two government officials familiar with the arrangements said.

Several of the companies have provided records continuously since 2006, while others have given the agency sporadic access, these officials said. These officials disclosed the number of participating companies in order to provide context for a series of disclosures about the NSA’s domestic collection policies. The officials, contacted independently, repeatedly said that “domestic collection” does not mean that the target is based in the U.S. or is a U.S. citizen; rather, it refers only to the origin of the data.

The Wall Street Journal reported today that U.S. credit card companies had also provided customer information. The officials would not disclose the names of the companies because, they said, doing so would provide U.S. enemies with a list of companies to avoid. They declined to confirm the list of participants in an internet monitoring program revealed by the Washington Post and the Guardian, but both confirmed that the program existed.

“The idea is to create a mosaic. We get a tip. We vet it. Then we mine the data for intelligence,” one of the officials said.

…It is not clear how the NSA interfaces with the companies. It cannot use standard law enforcement transmission channels to do, since most use data protocols that are not compatible with that hardware. Several of the companies mentioned in the Post report deny granting access to the NSA, although it is possible that they are lying, or that the NSA’s arrangements with the company are kept so tightly compartmentalized that very few people know about it. Those who do probably have security clearances and are bound by law not to reveal the arrangement.

This arrangement allows the U.S. companies to “stay out of the intelligence business,” one of the officials said. That is, the government bears the responsibility for determining what’s relevant, and the company can plausibly deny that it subjected any particular customer to unlawful government surveillance. Previously, Congressional authors of the FAA said that such a “get out of jail free” card was insisted by corporations after a wave of lawsuits revealed the extent of their cooperation with the government.

It is possible, but not likely, that the NSA clandestinely burrows into servers on American soil, without the knowledge of the company in question, although that would be illegal.

The 2008 FISA Amendments Act allow the NSA to analyze, with court orders, domestic communications of all types for counter-terrorism, counter-espionage, counter-narcotics and counter-proliferation purposes. If the agency believes that both ends of the communication, or the circle of those communicating, are wholly within the U.S., the FBI takes over. If one end of the conversation is outside the U.S., the NSA keeps control of the monitoring. An administration official said that such monitoring is subject to “extensive procedures,”but as the Washington Post reported, however, it is often very difficult to segregate U.S. citizens and residents from incidental contact.

Uh huh. And, if you believe that, you also believe that Obama learned about all these scandals which have broken in the last few weeks, when we did.

Back on February 6th, 2013, Breitbart.com featured this interesting quote from the absolutely corrupt Liberal House Member Maxine Waters:

“The President has put in place an organization with the kind of database that no one has ever seen before in life,” Representative Maxine Waters told Roland Martin on Monday. “That’s going to be very, very powerful,” Waters said. “That database will have information about everything on every individual on ways that it’s never been done before and whoever runs for President on the Democratic ticket has to deal with that. They’re going to go down with that database and the concerns of those people because they can’t get around it. And he’s [President Obama] been very smart. It’s very powerful what he’s leaving in place.” (h/t mark81150)

Bazinga.

According to The Godfather of Conservative Talk Shows, Rush Limbaugh, what we’re witnessing is a coup:

…Herb Meyer was the first to sound this notice some months ago. I also mentioned he wrote a piece that currently is in the American Thinker earlier this week, and it had the potential to be controversial because he used Adolf Hitler and Nazism in it, and it was his way of explaining, he made a point in the piece that nowhere, you know, people looking for a smoking gun to nail Obama on all these scandals, Herb says, “Ain’t gonna be one.”

He said whether you believe it or not, there is not one document linking Adolf Hitler to the holocaust. Adolf Hitler never put it on paper what he intended to do. There is no smoking gun. And yet what happened? We know that the Nazis engaged in the Holocaust. Herb Meyer’s point was that the people Hitler hired didn’t have to be told. They didn’t have to be given instructions. All they had to do was listen to what Hitler was saying. All they had to do was listen to what his objectives were. And he said the same thing’s happening here with this administration. He went to great pains to say: I’m not calling this administration a bunch of Nazis. I’m just using this as an illustration. I know people will get my point if I use something this notorious, the Nazi regime.

It’s a point that I’ve made here about the IRS. They say, “Well, you can’t link it in to Obama.” You don’t need to link Obama to it. He hired these people. Lois Lerner and everybody at the IRS who’s doing this is doing everything they can to please Obama. There’s not gonna be a smoking gun, but you don’t need a smoking gun to know where this administration’s doing what it’s doing.

Obama puts people in positions that mirror him. Eric Holder, you name it, they’re doing Obama’s bidding. Everybody. Susan Rice and Samantha Power, they are Obama, and there’s a context for what’s happening. Herbert Meyer, if I may quote him again, asserted that essentially what’s taking place in the United States right now is a coup, not a violent coup, and not a million artistic coup, but nevertheless a takeover of a government, and it’s being done by the Obama administration.

Let’s face it. Obama is nothing but a Community Organizer/Visiting Law lecturer,and Marxist/Alinsky-ite, groomed from an early age by Chicago Politicians and Democratic Powers Brokers to be “clean and articulate”. Financed by George Soros and others, he was built up, a la Nikolai Lenin, to be the savior of the masses, a figurehead, who would “cause the oceans to rise and fall”, “heal the sick, raise the dead, and make the little girls talk out of their heads” (Thank you, Johnny Rivers)…and faint at strategic moments in campaign rallies.

The problem is, the Democrats did not realize exactly how radical Barack Hussein Obama (mm mmm mmmm) was….nor how much of a megalomaniac.

According to insiders, he is a hands-off leader. He sits back and watches while others do the dirty work. After all, you didn’t expect Scooter to let work get in the way of improving his golf game and spending time with his former “body man”, Reggie Love, did you?

And, now, America finds itself governed by an Administration comprised of the same radicals who used to hold sit-ins in College Dean’s offices, utilizing the same Nazi-like methods of intimidation and suppression that they accused the Federal Government of in the 1960s.

That, boys and girls, is called “irony”.

On a final note: What remains curious to me, is with all of these scandals busting wide open, we still have not learned where America’s Commander in Chief was the night  of September 11, 2012, when those 4 Brave Americans were murdered by Muslim Terrorists at the Embassy Compound in Benghazi, Libya.

Perhaps, he was waiting to hear about it on the nightly news.

Until He Comes,

KJ

Operation PRISM: We Are All Now “Enemies of the State”

obamabigbroMy Administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government. We will work together to ensure the public trust and establish a system of transparency, public participation, and collaboration. Openness will strengthen our democracy and promote efficiency and effectiveness in Government.

Government should be transparent. Transparency promotes accountability and provides information for citizens about what their Government is doing. Information maintained by the Federal Government is a national asset. My Administration will take appropriate action, consistent with law and policy, to disclose information rapidly in forms that the public can readily find and use. Executive departments and agencies should harness new technologies to put information about their operations and decisions online and readily available to the public. Executive departments and agencies should also solicit public feedback to identify information of greatest use to the public.

President Barack Hussein Obama, “Transparency and Open Government”, 1/21/2009, whitehouse.gov

He lied.

Yesterday, Americans found out that their Federal Government, under the leadership of Barack Hussein Obama, utilizing the resources of the NSA, under the excuse of “National Security”, has been spying on literally all Americans, recording our cell phone conversations, along with keeping a record of our internet browsing, e-mails, and posts.

Regarding the monitoring of our phone calls, The New York Times reports…

The Obama administration is secretly carrying out a domestic surveillance program under which it is collecting business communications records involving Americans under a hotly debated section of the Patriot Act, according to a highly classified court order disclosed on Wednesday night.

The order, signed by Judge Roger Vinson of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in April, directs a Verizon Communications subsidiary, Verizon Business Network Services, to turn over “on an ongoing daily basis” to the National Security Agency all call logs “between the United States and abroad” or “wholly within the United States, including local telephone calls.”

The order does not apply to the content of the communications.

Verizon Business Network Services is one of the nation’s largest telecommunications and Internet providers for corporations. It is not clear whether similar orders have gone to other parts of Verizon, like its residential or cellphone services, or to other telecommunications carriers. The order prohibits its recipient from discussing its existence, and representatives of both Verizon and AT&T declined to comment Wednesday evening.

The Guardian,  a newspaper/website in the UK, reported on the phone call monitoring Wednesday night.

Yesterday, they reported that the NSA has been monitoring 15 of the biggest Internet Servers, including Apple, Google, and Facebook.

The NSA access is part of a previously undisclosed program called PRISM, which allows officials to collect material including search history, the content of emails, file transfers and live chats, the document says.

The Guardian has verified the authenticity of the document, a 41-slide PowerPoint presentation – classified as top secret with no distribution to foreign allies – which was apparently used to train intelligence operatives on the capabilities of the program. The document claims “collection directly from the servers” of major US service providers.

One of Obama’s biggest sycophants in the Main Stream Media, The New York Times, now says that Obama’s record of accountability and transparency leaves a lot to be desired:

The administration has now lost all credibility on this issue. Mr. Obama is proving the truism that the executive branch will use any power it is given and very likely abuse it.

The Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution reads:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

The shear magnitude of what we learned yesterday is overwhelming. The Government of the United States of America, the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave, has turned into a  New Politboro, so adept at spying on the New Proletariat, which its lousy economic policies has created, that it puts the old Soviet Union to shame.

Just think about it. Every phone call between you and your spouse, your kids, your parents, and the rest of your family, friends, business associates, and SPAM callers, are digitally recorded and kept in U.S. Government Archives, where they can be listened to by Government Agents.

Then, there’s the matter of the Monitoring of Internet Usage. Every time you get on Facebook or Twitter, or, even go to The Drudge Report to see what’s going on in the world, the Feds are making a record of your cyber-travels.

And, Lord help all of us Bloggers.

Thinking about the sheer number of recorded communications is mind-blowing.

Positively Orwellian, isn’t it?

Where will this blatant dismantling of the 4th Amendment lead us?

Will we all be led to “FEMA Camps” where we will have to watch a copy of the DVD of “Obama’s Speeches” over and over again, like the one he gave to the Queen of England when she visited the White House?

Will the “Men in Black” show up on our door step to take us away for writing blogs critical of Obama and his fellow Marxist/Alinskyites?

Speaking of them, I thought that those guys with the black suits and sunglasses on, outside my home, were just Mormons on a mission.

Obama has “radically changed” America, alright. He’s systematically taking our freedoms away.

Until He Comes,

KJ

Obama Runs the Ol’ Bait ‘n Switch “Oh, Look…Squirrel!”

obamaburningconstitutionHave you ever heard of Teapot Dome?

This was a Presidential Scandal involving Warren G. Harding in the early 1920s. It had to do with the secret leasing of federal oil reserves by the Secretary of the Interior, Albert Bacon Fall. After President Warren G. Harding transferred supervision of the naval oil reserve lands from the Navy to the Department of the Interior in 1921, Fall secretly granted to Harry F. Sinclair of the Mammoth Oil Company exclusive rights to the Teapot Dome (Wyoming) reserves. He then granted similar rights to Edward L. Doheny of Pan American Petroleum Company for the Elk Hills and Buena Vista Hills reserves in California (1921–22). In return for the leases, Fall received large cash gifts and no-interest “loans.”

When the scandal broke wide open, Congress ordered President Harding to cancel the leases. Then, the Supreme Court declared the leases fraudulent and ruled that Harding’s transfer of authority to Fall was illegal. Even though the president himself was not implicated in the transactions that had followed the transfer, the revelations of his associates’ misconduct took a severe toll on his health. Disillusioned and exhausted, he died before the full extent of the wrongdoing had been determined.

Fall was convicted of accepting a bribe in the Elk Hills negotiations and imprisoned. Doheny and Sinclair were acquitted of charges of bribery and criminal conspiracy, but Sinclair spent 6 1/2 months in prison for contempt of court and contempt of the U.S. Senate. Although the secretary of the navy, Edwin Denby, had signed all the leases, he was cleared of all charges.

Harding was a piker.

Our current President has not just one, but three scandals which he is under scrutiny about.

They must be serious, because Mooch is talking about going on an extended vacation.

So, what’s a Chicago Politician to do, to escape the heat of public attention? Why, run the ol’ Bait and Switch, of course.

Oh, look! Squirrel!

Speaking at the National Defense University in Washington Obama said, “America is at a crossroads. We must define our effort not as a boundless ‘global war on terror’ – but rather as a series of persistent, targeted efforts to dismantle specific networks of violent extremists that threaten America.”

In an attempt to define a new post-Sept. 11 era, Obama outlined new guidelines for the use of drones to kill terrorists overseas and pledged a renewed effort to close the military detention center in Guantanamo Bay.  In the speech, Obama argued that, “In the years to come, not every collection of thugs that labels themselves al Qaida will pose a credible threat to the United States.” He warned that “unless we discipline our thinking and our actions, we may be drawn into more wars we don’t need to fight.”

With efforts under way in Congress to redefine the 2001 authorization to use military force (AUMF) against al Qaida, Obama said he would work with Congress “in efforts to refine, and ultimately repeal, the AUMF’s mandate. And I will not sign laws designed to expand this mandate further.”

Toward the end of Obama’s address as he discussed the Guantanamo detainees, he was repeatedly interrupted by heckling from Medea Benjamin, founder of the antiwar group Code Pink, whose members have frequently been arrested for disrupting hearings on Capitol Hill – but Obama patiently said that Benjamin’s concerns are “something to be passionate about.”

“We must define the nature and scope of this struggle, or else it will define us, mindful of James Madison’s warning that ‘No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare.’ Neither I, nor any president, can promise the total defeat of terror,” he declared.

Uh huh. Speaking of Freedom, Scooter…regarding that little matter of  the DOJ spying on the Associated Press and other reporters, including fox News…

President Obama is a little uneasy with the way journalists have been dragged into the Justice Department’s aggressive pursuit of national security leak investigations. In fact, he has ordered Attorney General Eric Holder to conduct a 45-day review of the department’s guidelines on the issue.

That bit of news was buried in the middle of the president’s hourlong speech today at National Defense University.

“Journalists should not be at legal risk for doing their jobs,” President Obama said. “Our focus must be on those who break the law.”

And then the news: “I have raised these issues with the attorney general, who shares my concern. So he has agreed to review existing Department of Justice guidelines governing investigations that involve reporters, and will convene a group of media organizations to hear their concerns as part of that review. And I have directed the attorney general to report back to me by July 12th.”

So…the president has Top Men on the problem …Top Men…And AG Holder is the pinnacle.

About your “Top Man”, Scooter…

Openchannel.nbcnews.com reports

Attorney General Eric Holder signed off on a controversial search warrant that identified Fox News reporter James Rosen as a “possible co-conspirator” in violations of the Espionage Act and authorized seizure of his private emails, a law enforcement official told NBC News on Thursday.

The disclosure of the attorney general’s role came as President Barack Obama, in a major speech on his counterterrorism policy, said Holder had agreed to review Justice Department guidelines governing investigations that involve journalists.

“I am troubled by the possibility that leak investigations may chill the investigative journalism that holds government accountable,” Obama said. “Journalists should not be at legal risk for doing their jobs.”

Rosen, who has not been charged in the case, was nonetheless the target of a search warrant that enabled Justice Department investigators to secretly seize his private emails after an FBI agent said he had “asked, solicited and encouraged … (a source) to disclose sensitive United States internal documents and intelligence information.”

Obama’s comments follow a firestorm of criticism that has erupted over disclosures that in separate investigations of leaks of classified information, the Justice Department had obtained private emails that Rosen exchanged with a source and the phone records of Associated Press reporters.

Back in the old Soviet Union,  The Proletariat (average citizens) couldn’t sneeze without a KGB Agent saying, “Gesundheit!”

I never never dreamed that Americans would be under an oppressive Politburo like they were.

It is time for the American people to demand that their servants in Washington move forward with Special Prosecutors in all three Scandals.

Justice…and the preservation of American Freedom requires no less.

Until He Comes,

KJ