A comment posted on my blog on Monday started me thinking. It pointed out that in order for the FairTax to really work, we must repeal the 16^th Amendment which allowed the income tax. It also said that we should repeal the 17^th Amendment. At first this surprised me, and then I started thinking about it.

The 16^th and 17^th Amendments were both passed the same year, 1913. Combined they represent the largest consolidation of federal power in our history. The 16^th Amendment gave Congress access to massive new revenue and the power to shape society through “creative” taxation. The 17^th Amendment removed power from the states by changing the way U.S. Senators are elected.

When the Constitution was written, the Founders deliberately made it difficult for the Federal government to raise money. The majority of the work of governing, they felt, was to be left to the states. They also built a plan that was designed to protect us from the tyranny of democracy. The House of Representatives was to be “the People’s House” with membership based on population and popularly elected every two years. The Senate was to represent the states, two Senators from each state selected by the state legislatures and serving for staggered six year terms. The 17^th Amendment changed this to allow for the popular election of Senators.

After the Civil War, one of the more profound changes was in the role of the federal government and how the government and country are perceived. As was pointed out in the movie National Treasure 2, prior to the Civil War, the country was considered in the plural: the United States are in North America. After the Civil War the country was considered in the singular: the United States is in North America. (Interesting side note: MS-Word considers both usages to be grammatically correct.)

These two Amendments laid the ground work for the New Deal, the “Great Society”, the “War on Poverty” and every other populist program that was implemented in the 20^th century. By giving the federal government the power to tax based on income and by making Senators responsive to the people rather than the states, these Amendments forever changed the nature of our country.

I believe that it can be safely argued that these two Amendments set the course for the destruction of the American Republic and have directly lead us to the situation we have today where an elite Oligarchy runs most of the country and through control of much of the media, the education system and Congress has successfully made the states and even the Constitution itself irrelevant.

The new Congress and President have made it clear that they do not consider themselves bound by Constitutional constraints. They have begun the rapid nationalization of our financial system and key industries to the point where only three weeks into Obama’s term Newsweek magazine victoriously proclaims on its cover that “WE ARE ALL SOCIALISTS NOW.”

 Edmund Burke said “all that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” Unfortunately we have done nothing for too long, we have accepted each government intrusion into our lives: from airbags to Waco, from Elian Gonzalez to the TSA, from punitive taxes to the “Fairness Doctrine” all the way to the government seizure of our homes to allow the building of a mall.

The Declaration of Independence tells us that while “[p]rudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.”

Are we too late? I hope not. But if President Obama and Congress continue on this reckless course, I am terribly afraid that consequences will be horrible, not just financially, but to our entire way of life.

As someone once said, now is time for all good men to come to the aid of their country. We are in real trouble folks; right now it is time to just say no. Start by contacting your representatives in Congress, your Senators, your legislators, your Governor and make sure they hear you. Write letters to the editor of the your local paper, your regional paper and national publications. Join the Heritage Foundation (www.heritage.org), the National Rifle Association (www.nra.org), and FairTax.org (www.fairtax.org). Let your voice be heard. Nearly 60 million Americans voted against President Obama. Millions more are likely regretting their vote today. We can get back on track and we must. Because if this doesn’t work, the next steps will be more painful, like stopping paying taxes and stopping participating in this monstrosity they are building.

Please act today, before it really is too late.

God Bless America

Later today, in all likelihood, the monstrous spendulus program will probably pass the Senate courtesy of three foolish Senators who call themselves Republicans. This bill will do little or nothing to stimulate the economy (as reported by the Congressional Budget Office and many others). In fact it will make things worse by simply extending and exacerbating the credit crisis and deepening the current recession.

There is a relatively simple solution to the economic problem we face. The good news is most of Washington knows what the solution is, the bad news is that they won’t implement it because it takes away too much of their power over us.

The solution is called the FairTax. I won’t go into all the arguments for it here, I hope you will read Neal Boortz’s and John Linder’s books on the subject. They are most persuasive. But I do want to point out a couple of key components of the FairTax that would virtually guarantee a quick end to this recession:

First, paying taxes would become truly voluntary. It would be your decision when or if to purchase something and thus incur the tax. You would be able to keep 100% of your income (from any source) because there would be no income tax, no Social Security tax, and no Medicare tax.  Also that income would likely go up across the board because there would be no corporate taxes, dividends can rise, because there would be no company contribution to Social Security, some of that money could pass to employees. Further, competition would force prices down now that the tax component of the cost of goods is removed.

Secondly, the elimination of the current 35% corporate income tax would make the United States the most attractive place in the world to run a business. Studies have shown that TRILLIONS of dollars of new investment would pour into the United States as businesses chose to move here rather than offshore.

So why won’t Congress do this if it is such a great plan? Simple: manipulating the current tax code is the way Congress-critters hand out favors and manipulate the voters. Plus, if the economy is booming and people are in control of their own lives, they won’t want or need big government.

It is an unfortunate truth that Congress has become an oligarchy. Protected by gerrymandering and special interests, Congress has broken faith with the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution and has set its own interests above those of the American people.

To find out more about the FairTax, please click on the logo below.

God Bless America

Barack Obama is unhappy. His Trillion Dollar spending package is being held up by the mean old Republicans in the Senate and he doesn’t like it. Yesterday in an editorial in the Washington Post and in a speech at the energy department he said that the time for talking is over, it is time for action. Actually I think what he meant was “I won, I won, you have to do what I say when I say!”

Mr. President, we are talking about nearly a TRILLION dollars here. That is over and above the $700 BILLION first bailout, and the TWO TRILLION dollar federal budget. If (more likely when) this monstrosity passes, the government will be taking a larger percentage of GDP than at any time since WWII.

The President wants to be seen as “doing something” about the problem. He doesn’t appear to be concerned about whether it is the right thing to do or not. He also doesn’t seem to care if a few extra hundred billion dollars get wasted as long as the bill gets passed.

Had he actually spent time in the Senate rather than on the campaign trail during his brief stint as Illinois’ junior senator, he would recognize that while the House can ram things through quickly, the Senate is more deliberative. When the bill passed the House despite heavy bi-partisan opposition, it was immediately clear that the bill would have to change drastically to get through the Senate and to get past the people who are growing more and more disenchanted with the bill the more they hear about it.

A more experienced leader would have recognized this immediately and taken action to lead the debate to get the best bill possible through. Instead, he has basically stamped his feet and had a temper tantrum.  This, combined with his missteps on his cabinet nominations and the firm rejection of his “open hands” policy by Iran, is not an auspicious start for the young Presidency. While I am not a big fan of Vice President Biden, I think it is time for him to take the President aside and teach him some of the facts of life of Washington before this gets even uglier than it already is. Barack Obama is our president and will be for nearly four more years. He has a lot to learn.

God Bless America

When I moved to “Hotlanta” last fall I was prepared for the extreme heat and humidity caused by global warming. Global warming is, after all, a proven fact according to Al Gore. I am quite sure he has a detailed explanation of how “climate change” (notice they don’t call it global warming anymore?) is causing the 17° (F) temperature this morning with wind chill well below zero! But never mind, today I want to talk about another kind of chill.

One of the ACLU’s favorite rallying cries has been that government laws on obscenity, refusal to fund certain “art” and restrictions on flag burning have a “chilling effect” on freedom of speech. So where is the ACLU now that the President of the United States has used his office to tell people to stop listening to a particular talk show host and the official campaign arm of the Democrat party has started a petition to criticize and remove that host from the air. According to the Chicago Tribune, Obama’s “tech savvy” campaign, flooded a local radio station with calls to prevent Obama critics Stanley Kurtz and David Freddoso from appearing on air. Obama’s campaign also asked the justice department to investigate a third party organization that was airing ads exposing Obama’s close relationship with unrepentant terrorist William Ayers.

Had these tactics been used by George W. Bush the media would be screaming in outrage and Congress would be calling for special prosecutors. Instead Congress is working to reinstate the so-called “Fairness Doctrine” which was repealed in 1987 by President Reagan. The “Fairness” doctrine was imposed by the FCC in the 1930s to ensure that “equal time” was given to opposing viewpoints. By 1987 it was recognized that television and the availability of multiple sources of information had made the rule obsolete. 

The repeal of the Fairness Doctrine led to an explosion of talk radio lead by Rush Limbaugh. Now talk dominates the AM radio frequencies and is popular on satellite radio as well. For whatever reason, the market has determined that conservative talk radio has been very successful; virtually all liberal shows plus “Air America” have failed. Having failed in the marketplace, the liberals are now, as usual, turning to other areas where they have more control. Just as they turn to the Courts when the people block their goals, here they are turning to the past to censor talk radio. Note that the Fairness Doctrine applies ONLY to radio, not TV, the Internet or print media. The sole purpose of reinstating the Fairness doctrine is to attempt to silence Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Neal Boortz, Howie Carr, and the rest of the conservative commentators.

I urge all my readers to contact your representatives in Congress and urge them to oppose the reintroduction of the Fairness Doctrine. Free speech is one of our most precious rights and we must stop this attempt to stifle it.

God Bless America

Recently I had a long conversation with a very conservative “trusted advisor” about the future of our country. This individual is convinced that we have lost the war, the great experiment in freedom known as the United States is over. Needless to say, I disagree. But what truly bothered me about the conversation was not the defeatism, but the reasoning behind it.

As the conversation progressed it became clear that my friend felt that the problem was that Americans are too stupid to vote the right way. It occurred to me that I had heard this argument before. It is the argument that is used to justify virtually every liberal program and concept. Parents can’t raise their own children, “it takes a village”; we can’t be trusted to manage our own retirements, government must provide “security”; Americans can’t be trusted with guns, and so on.

This is a very dangerous trap that leads to a belief that the ends justify the means. This is the liberal view that explains why they see no problem with attempting (and sometimes succeeding) to steal elections in Washington state, Minnesota, and Florida. This is why liberals turn to the courts rather than the people when they want to force their agenda on America.

 For forty years we have allowed the left to control the education and media in this country. The problem is not that Americans are stupid, we are not. However we are not as well educated or informed about civics and politics as we should be. We have been lied to and manipulated and indoctrinated into believing more in government than in ourselves. But I believe that Americans still understand freedom and still desire it more than anything. But in the absence of strong leaders committed to freedom, Americans sometimes fall for strong speakers with a compelling message of hope and change, particularly when he is running against a candidate without a strong message of freedom following an unpopular President.

 Gerald Ford was defeated by Jimmy Carter’s big smile and easy manner when the voters were sickened by Watergate and the loss of the Vietnam War. But only four years later, Ronald Reagan told them that he knew Americans could do anything, that the “malaise” existed only in Washington and that government was not the solution to the problem, government was the problem.  Ronald Reagan’s magic wasn’t his speaking skills or rhetoric; it was his fundamental belief in the goodness of America and Americans. He spoke directly to the American people as often as possible, when the liberals in Congress tried to block his goals, he didn’t turn to the courts, he turned to the people.

When Ronald Reagan was elected president in 1980 the Dow Jones Industrial average stood at 771, interest rates, inflation and unemployment all stood in double-digits, the Soviet Union had invaded Afghanistan, 52 Americans were being held hostage by the Iranian government, and the Cold War was at its peak.

When Ronald Reagan left office eight years later, our economy was booming in what would become the longest peacetime growth in our nation’s history. The Cold War was effectively over with the collapse of the Soviet Union a few years later.

In 1976 when Jimmy Carter was elected, I am quite sure there were many who believe that the American dream was over. Teddy Kennedy was pushing universal healthcare, taxes were brutally high and the government was expanding every day. Our military was being cut back and demoralized. In many ways February 1997 resembled February 2009. In that there is a message of real hope. Americans are not stupid. If we conservatives can put forth our message with a strong, likable candidate with an unwavering message of freedom, personal responsibility and personal success. That candidate will win in a landslide; particularly if President Obama continues down his current path.

If, on the other hand, we put forward a candidate like John McCain, with a “centrist” message trying to appeal to the left as well as the right, we will again lose and deservedly so. Americans want a strong leader to protect their freedoms, to fight for them in Congress and overseas. They don’t want a milquetoast seeking compromise on every issue. Despite all of the media whining about bi-partisanship, the record clearly shows that the American people want the conflict and consider it good.

I hope that everyone will keep the faith in the American dream and the American people alive. We are a great people and we will survive this as we have survived in the past. We have a long war ahead of us, and we will have to fight for every inch of freedom against Obama’s encroachments. We have lost a major battle, but the war is far from over. We Shall Return.

God Bless America

Former Rep. Dick Armey was scolded after losing his cool during an appearance on Hardball last night, where he told Salon editor in chief Joan Walsh he’s "so damn glad” she isn’t his wife.

Walsh and Armey were in a heated debate about the relevance of Rush Limbaugh in the GOP.

“I am so damn glad that you could never be my wife, ‘cause I surely wouldn't have to listen to that prattle from you every day,” Armey said.

"Well, that makes two of us," Walsh shot back.

New York Times columnist Bob Herbert, waiting off camera for an appearance, said: "Dick Armey was so far out of line in the last segment with his sexist comments, and he owes Joan Walsh and your viewers and apology."

Matthews later apologized on behalf of the former House Majority Leader, and said the comments were "overboard."

Who'da thunk it? The Republicans in the House united to kill the "stimulus" bill. Oops... they found their stones only a few months late. Maybe if they had had the guts to do this last fall we would be dealing with this crisis and a Congress and President determined to make it worse!

But fear not, we can stop it with a filibuster in the Senate, right?? Au Contraire! You forget the quality of geniuses we put there. Does anyone really believe that George "don't make me cry anymore" Voinovich and Olympia "I thought Republican was Greek for Socialist" Snowe and the other RINOs in the swamp will actually do anything different from what they have done over the past 10 years?

Regrettably, the "slippery slope" to socialism and the destruction of the American economy has now become a $2 Trillion cliff that we are approaching at warp 6. I have little faith in Voinovich, Snowe, et.al. being able (or even trying) to keep us from rushing straight to hell.

It is a very sad time in America.

God Save the United States

One week ago today, Barack Hussein Obama took the oath office swearing before God to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. The following day, he took the oath again. He has already violated it. Last week I urged him to read the Constitution and to follow it. Now I realize it doesn’t matter if he has read it or not, he doesn’t care what it says.

In the first week of the Obama regime, he and his minions in Congress have done more to damage this country than I could have imagined in my worst nightmares. I am not sure George Orwell could have written such a horrifying script.

Congress is putting together a “Truth Commission” (no kidding, that is what they are calling it) to investigate “war crimes” by the Bush administration. Squeaker of the House Nancy “rights of the minority” Pelosi has issued rules prohibiting the Republican minority from offering substitute bills on the house floor. Meanwhile Obama has ordered that the terrorists being held safely in Cuba be brought here and given all the rights of citizens, even as our own rights as real citizens are being trampled.

The President has demonstrated that all he cares about is power. His so-called stimulus plan is designed to make sure that the majority of the voters pay no income taxes so that there will be no opposition to any future taxes on the “rich” and that the country will become more addicted to the drug of government spending and will not see the domination and control until too late.

He has issued executive orders that will lead to the deaths of not only our auto industry, but thousands of Americans on the highways who are forced to buy cars made of recycled tissue paper. He will then use those deaths to force greater regulations on us, such as sharply reduced speed limits, mandatory public transportation, no conversations in automobiles, penalties for not carpooling, and God only knows what else.

He has proven his hypocrisy on the subject of economic stimulation by surrendering federal control of interstate commerce to the states in clear violation of the Constitution (an impeachable offense by the way) with the unavoidable result of the final destruction of the domestic automobile industry.

He has, through executive order, provided our money for the purposes of expanding the genocide that has taken over 50,000,000 (that’s FIFTY MILLION) lives in the past 36 years in this country alone (makes Hitler and Stalin look like pikers doesn’t it?). This demonstrates that race is not a motivation for him, just power, since the vast majority of the victims of this genocide are black.

Next he plans to begin negotiations with Iran! On what topic I wonder? Which city they will nuke first? How much money we will give them to keep them nuking Israel during Barack’s first term? How soon we will turn over the keys to Baghdad to them? How soon we will replace the Constitution with Sharia Law? How does one negotiate with a country whose stated purpose is our destruction and that of our closest ally in the Mideast?

Wasn’t it just last week that he told us that it was time to end partisan bickering and to work together, that we should reach out open hands because that would unclench fists? But what was his response to Representative Cantor when he questioned part of the stimulus bill? “I won.” 

Never in our country’s great history has any president done so much damage and gathered so much power in so short a time. The media lap dogs are so eager to have him smile at them (so they can feel a chill run up their collective legs) that they are more than complicit in his actions.

God Save America

 What’s Wrong with this Picture? Moral equivalence is eating away at our society. Consider the following from a Fox News report on the crash of US Airways Flight 1549 in the Hudson River:

She and a friend had been to Times Square, Central Park and ground zero, where nearly 3,000 people were killed in the Sept. 11 attacks. She said she was struck by the contrast between one disaster in which so many people died and another in which everyone survived.

"It's a miracle," she said. "I guess New Yorkers can't take any more tragedy."

I have to agree with her that the safe landing of Flt 1549 was nearly miraculous. But the comparison of the two incidents is, to me at least, very jarring.

The US Air flight resulted in no loss of life by a combination of luck, God’s will, and the incredible training, skill, courage and dedication of a flight crew fully committed to the responsibility of caring for those who entrusted with them with their lives for the flight from New York to Charlotte. The flight crew had only moments to decide what to do not only to protect the lives of their charges but also life on the ground.

On the other hand, vicious cowards with no regard for human life deliberately and callously carried out the September 11, 2001 attacks. It was not a “disaster”, “tragedy”, or bad luck. It was an act of war by cowards who refused to obey even the simplest rules of warfare. In violation of every rule ever created, they deliberately and cowardly targeted innocent civilians.

A point that is ignored (or not understood) by the liberal apologists around the world (including President Obama) is that the United States was under no obligation to treat the individuals we have captured in Afghanistan and Iraq or elsewhere as Prisoners of War. In fact, under the Geneva Conventions we had and have every legal right to hold them without trial or hearing throughout the time of conflict. We also have the right to execute them as War Criminals for violating both our laws and international laws, including the Geneva Conventions, that prohibit deliberate targeting of civilians and engaging in combat or terror activities while disguised as a civilian.

Now President Obama wishes to either release these pathetic cowards or transport them to our own shores and give them the rights of citizens of the United States. The very people that they are determined to exterminate.

These cowards, from Osama bin Laden cowering in his cave somewhere, to his state sponsors in the Taliban, Iran and formerly in Iraq, to the Hamas cowards in Palestine are not willing to even stand up and fight for their cause like men. They launch (or fund) random attacks against innocents using suicide bombers and random missile fire to target civilian not military targets. Then when free countries fight back, carefully targeting only military targets and even warning of planned attacks, these same cowards and their apologists whine and cry to the United Nations about the bullies in Israel and Washington.

President Bush’s greatest success has had the unfortunate effect of allowing people to forget that there are sub-human cowards out there who are determined to kill us all, wherever we are. That threat has not changed since 9/11. We have done an outstanding job fighting it to prevent another attack on U.S. soil. Was there anyone in the world on 9/12/2001 or even 2004 who would have been willing to bet that there would not be another attack before the end of 2008?

We have now elected one of those apologists as President and his first act as President was to close the detention center at Guantanamo Bay and to commit that no terrorist has anything to fear from us if they get captured and no reason to give us any information. They will only be questioned gently and politely and if we offend them or hurt their feelings in any way, they can probably sue us in our courts.

I am ready right now to stand up and predict that we will be attacked again on our soil, sometime in the next four years. It is also quite easy to predict that the liberals in our media, Congress and White House will say that the fault is George W. Bush’s because he made the world hate us. Never mind that the first attack on the World Trade Center in 1993 and the attack on the USS Cole took place under Bill Clinton’s watch and 9/11 attack was less than nine months after Bush took office. I would love to hear how President Bush 43 made Osama bin Laden hate us in 1993!

I don’t give a damn if the UN, the left, the European "elite", the dictators, and the terrorists hate us, as long as they respect and/or are scared of our power and our commitment to “pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.”

President Obama has set us on a course of appeasement that will lead only to disrespect and will create a perception of weakness. In clear and certain terms he has told the world that President Kennedy was just kidding. He has told them that we are ready to reach out our open hands and hope our enemies will open their fists and join us in a rousing chorus of Kumbaya and that we have the audacity to hope they will be nice to us now that nasty Mr. Bush is gone.

When we compare an act of heroism and life saving with the cowardly acts of wanton destruction against innocents, we empower the terrorists and encourage them to strike again.

God Bless America

Another busy morning, another link to a very interesting article. I am not sure I agree with everything it says, but it certainly is thought provoking. I will be back with a full entry tomorrow.  -Jim

http://www.whiskeyandgunpowder.com/a-few-nations-under-god/

Dear Mr. President:

Congratulations on becoming the 44^th President of the United States. I wish you the best of success in that most difficult office. As you familiarize yourself with the White House I hope that you will take the time to read (re-read I hope) the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution to remind yourself of the full burden that you are about to undertake.

Mr. President, these documents, which you spoke of so highly in your inaugural address today, deserve and require more than lip service. Much of what you spoke of in your speech is diametrically opposed to the ideals set forth in those documents. Freedom is not provided by government. It is not the government’s responsibility to help people find jobs or homes or medical care. It is the job of the government to stay out of the way, and to make sure that others stay out of the way, of each individual’s God-given freedom to make their own way in the world, powered by their own innate skills and abilities.

Mr. President, God has given us conscience and the desire to help those who cannot help themselves. Government has taken that desire away and impersonalized it, removed it from the American psyche so that now we view a homeless person and see it as a government problem, not a problem for us to deal with as individuals.

Mr. President, when we look at the world and see countries where the citizens are trapped in poverty and opportunity is denied, we cannot help them by simply sending money to their captors or extending an open hand hoping that they will unclench their fists. We must help them by opening free trade and opportunity, showing the people and their governments that the strength of any nation comes from the individuals that make up its citizenry. Those individuals, each pursuing his or her own brand of success and satisfaction, are the people that truly benefit the “common good” for as each one achieves more, they also share more, either via their purchases, their gifts, or their good works.

Mr. President, when you penalize the most successful in our country, the pain will be felt most by the least among us; for they are the ones whose jobs will be lost; they are the ones who will no longer be building homes, yachts, cars, or anything else.

Mr. President, the Declaration and the Constitution lay out these values clearly and precisely. The Constitution places sharp restrictions on the authority of the government. Although these restrictions have been honored mostly in the breach over the past 76 years, they are critically important. If you follow those restrictions and move government out of the way by reducing spending and reducing ALL taxes you will be amazed at what this country can do.

Mr. President, I pray for your success in office, I pray for the future of our nation. Please bring your capabilities and strengths to bear to ensure that our nation is more free in 2012 than it is today, that my daughter will grow up in a country founded on and still based upon individual freedom and responsibility.

God Bless you and God Bless America,

James W. Hunt

 “I have a dream…” this may be one of the most famous speeches in history, and one of the most important. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. had a dream that one day all men (which includes all women) would be “judged not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”

Tomorrow, for the first time in our history, a President will take office who is not a white male. It has taken nearly 233 years since the phrase “all men are created equal” was penned. But we now have hopefully gotten past the belief that a person’s skin color is somehow relevant to his or her character, capabilities, or intelligence.

But have we really? Has the same set of criteria been used to judge Barack Obama as George W. Bush or any other previous president? If not, why?? President-elect Obama’s inauguration is shaping up more like a coronation. The media frenzy that has surrounded him for nearly a year of unquestioning adulation continues. Controversies that have destroyed previous president’s nominees are being ignored, as are many of Obama’s own questionable acts.

What would Dr. King think of Obama’s relationship with racists like Rev. Wright and Louis Farrakhan? What would he think of Obama’s relationship with un-repentant terrorist William Ayers or crime mogul Tony Rezko?

God Bless America

The congressionally chartered National Safety Council has called for a complete ban on the use of cellular phones while driving. This includes hands-free devices. The group’s president and chief executive, Janet Froetscher likened cell phone use to drunk driving. “It's not just what you're doing with your hands — it's that your head is in the conversation and so your eyes are not on the road," Froetscher said.

Let’s assume for the moment, that the NSC statistics are correct. The conclusion they have drawn is that having a conversation while driving is dangerous and should be forbidden. What’s next? Ticketing drivers who have a conversation with a passenger? Better yet, let’s ban passengers! What about kids? Is there anything more distracting than a screaming six month old in a rear facing child seat in the back seat of the car (another great idea from the government since they mandated front airbags)?

Let’s ban kids in cars unless two adults are present… oh wait! That discriminates against single parents!

To hell with it. Let’s just ban cars and make everyone use public transportation. On second thought, that is just what these people want. Let’s not give them any ideas.

God Bless America

 Yesterday I saw a picture from the White House. Five men: three former presidents, the current president and the next president, all standing together. Two things immediately came to my mind as I looked at that photograph.

The first was the thought that when the first of those presidents took office 32 years ago and the President-elect was anticipating his 16^th birthday, one of the continuing news stories of the day was forced busing in Boston and the continued racial tensions there and elsewhere in the country. Now we have a black man about to become the most powerful man in the world. I might have preferred it be J.C. Watts, or Michael Steele or Condaleeza Rice but I cannot help to be proud that we as a people have come so far so fast after such an inexcusably long time.

The other fact that struck me is how special this country is in the way we manage these transitions. During this time of economic crisis and ongoing war, our country is undergoing a radical shift in leadership. Control is changing from one “faction” to another. But there is no bloodshed; no former leaders jailed or executed. No matter how much the parties may disagree, the current president will step down in 12 days and return to private life, respected and honored for the service he has given his country, just as his predecessors have been.

On January 20, 2009 Barack Hussein Obama will become the 44^th President of the United States of America. Following a procedure designed over 200 years ago, a man who – had he lived at that time – might have been a slave, will take the oath of office and become the most powerful man in the world. Not be force of arms, but by the ballot box.

Whatever we may feel about President-elect Obama’s policies, he is about to become our president. He will become only the 44^th man ever to hold that office and forever more he will join the rarified company of Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Lincoln, Roosevelt, Kennedy, Reagan, and all the others.

I am proud of a country that, despite our differences, despite our challenges, continues to move forward with peaceful transitions of power at the people’s will. I pray that it will always be thus. We should all pray for President-elect Obama and wish him a safe and successful term in office. We stand ready to oppose him when necessary using the tools our Founders gave us in the Constitution, but we also stand ready to support him just as firmly when it is appropriate to do so. Right, wrong or indifferent, he is about to become the President of United States. God Bless him and …

God Bless America