If you receive this and you hate it and you don’t want to ever read it no matter what...that is fine; email me back and you will be deleted from my list (which is almost at the maximum anyway).

I attempt to post a new issue each Sunday by 2 or 3 pm central standard time (I sometimes fail at this attempt).

I try to include factual material only, along with my opinions (it should be clear which is which). I make an attempt to include as much of this week’s news as I possibly can. The first set of columns are intentionally designed for a quick read.

I do not accept any advertising nor do I charge for this publication. I write this principally to blow off steam in a nation where its people seemed have collectively lost their minds.

And if you are a believer in Jesus Christ, always remember: We do not struggle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places (Eph. 6:12).

California’s Proposition 8, which defined marriage, was struck down by a lone judge.

Lawyers for gay couples, California Gov. Schwarzenegger and Attorney General Jerry Brown have all filed legal motions Friday telling a federal judge that allowing same-sex marriages to resume immediately in the state.

In a related story, GOProud, a Washington-based group that represents gay conservatives, announced Friday that feisty right-wing pundit Ann Coulter would keynote the organization's upcoming "Homocon" fundraiser party.

U.S. automobile giant General Motors Co. (Called by may, Government Motors) said that it plans to invest close to $500 million in its Ramos Arizpe plant in northern Mexico to produce a new line of engines as well as a new vehicle.

It has come to light that General Motors, Chrysler and Citigroup, three of the biggest bailout recipients, have continued to remain politically active, through their political action committees, federal lobbying or direct donations to the pet projects of lawmakers.

In the White House briefing room, AP took Helen Thomas’s center seat, FoxNews took AP’s old seat (on the front row) and NPR moved up to FoxNews’ old second row center seat.

Christina Romer is stepping down from her position as an economic advisor on Obama’s team.

The Senate passes a $4.5 billion school lunch program, to improve school lunches in schools.

71% of Missouri voters backed a ballot measure, Proposition C, that would prohibit the government from requiring people to have health insurance or from penalizing them for not having it. This occurred on President Obama’s birthday and was virtually ignored by all media outlets, apart from FoxNews and TalkRadio.

Newsweek Magazine, which has been losing money for a long time, was sold for $1.

Lady Gaga: “I got a phone call from a couple of really big rock and rollers, big pop stars, big rappers, and they said, ‘we'd like you to boycott Arizona because of SB-1070.’ And I said, ‘you really think that us dumb f***ing pop stars are going to collapse the economy of Arizona?’”

Had Lady Gaga only had the sense to stop right there, and go on with the concert, she would have been praised for her wisdom from many. Unfortunately, she then added, “I'll tell you what we have to do about SB-1070. We have to be active. We have to actively protest. The nature of the Monster Ball is to actively protest prejudice, and injustice, and that bullsh*t that is put on our society because you're a superstar, no matter who you are, no matter where you come from and you were born that way! I will not cancel my show. I will yell and I will scream louder. And I will hold you, and we will hold each other, and we will peaceably protest this state. Because if it wasn't for all of you immigrants, this country wouldn't have sh*t. And I mean it. I mean it so deeply in my soul.”

Robert Gibbs, when asked to take a position on the building of a mosque near ground zero in NYC, answered: "I think this is rightly a matter for New York City and the local community to decide." Arizona taking steps to defend itself? Not a local issue. The arrest of a black professor, Henry Louis Gates, by a white policeman is not a local issue. But building a mosque to mark a great Islamic victory in New York City, as a part of radical Islam’s attack on the United States—that is a local issue.

Speaker Pelosi, said, awhile ago, that her favorite word was the Word, “My favorite word is the Word, is the Word. And that is everything. It says it all for us. And you know the biblical reference, you know the Gospel reference of the Word. And that Word, is, we have to give voice to what that means in terms of public policy that would be in keeping with the values of the Word. The Word. Isn't it a beautiful word when you think of it? It just covers everything.” The Word refers to John 1:1, 14a: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God...And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.

CNS news asked Pelosi about this: “So, when was the Word made flesh? Was it at the Annunciation, when Jesus was conceived by the power of the Holy Sprit, as the Creed says, or was it at the Nativity when he was born of the Virgin Mary? And when did the Word get the right to life?"”

Pelosi answered: "Whenever it was, we bow our heads when we talk about it in church, and that's where I'd like to talk about that."

Lead line from AP story this week: WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama is capping his birthday week with an afternoon of golfing on Saturday and a barbecue on Sunday. The story on this was very much like the many stories that AP did on George Bush’s birthday weeks (that is sarcasm, by the way).

Rosie O’Donnell: “George Bush, in the middle of a war, had an all-station news conference to announce how horrible it was for the safety of America that gay people were getting married in San Francisco, which pissed me off enough to get on a plane and go get married.” Only the final statement is true, by the way, starting from her getting on a plane.

Lanny J. Davis, lawyer, political columnist and former Clinton aide wrote “Rush Limbaugh is not a laughing matter because he is not only a purveyor of hate and misinformation, but more dangerous, millions of people believe him. Anyone who checks the facts will not take him seriously."

Newsweek's Howard Fineman said, “Any fair-minded observer would say in those first months, those first key months, Barack Obama`s leadership and the decisions they made, which actually had their roots with Hank Paulson and Ben Bernanke in the previous administration, were good ones and smart ones and saved the day.”

MSNBC’s Cenk Uygur: “Now, look, I like to make predictions, so here's a nice controversial one for you. The Tea Party is the cancer of the Republican Party...After 2010, the long, sad decline of the Republican Party will begin and we will look back and say it started at a party, the Tea Party.”

Bob Beckle to Sean Hannity: “Hannity, anything that makes you happy is my life’s work.”

Congressman Pete Stark, at a townhall meeting, speaking to some of his constituents: "I think that there are very few constitutional limits that would prevent the federal government from rules that could affect your private life. The basis for that would be how would it affect other people."

After the questioner asks what possible constitutional limits there are, then, if Obamacare can pass constitutional muster, Stark replies: "The federal government yes, can do most anything in this country."

The questioner, outraged: "You, sir, and people like you are destroying this nation."

Stark, smirking: "And I guess you're here to save it. And that makes me very uncomfortable."

After Glenn Beck made a list of some of the what the stimulus was spend on, he remarked, “They call Sarah Palin stupid but this is okay [pointing to projects of waste on his chalk board]; let me tell you something; at least Sarah Palin has never spent $2 million on ants.”

Rich Lowry’s comment, to the idea that the imam for the Twin Tower’s mosque sees himself as a bridge builder: “If you want to build bridges, you condemn terrorism and you do not build a mosque in the shadow of the Twin Towers.” (almost an exact quote).

Dennis Miller: “I say we build a long, skinny mosque all along our Southern border with Mexico...Skinny one the length of the border. The Mexicans are going to whine about that. The Islams will whine back. And everybody is happy.”

Toby from Bulls and Bears, speaking of the Stimulus Bill waste: “Why no fill a car with cash and drive down the street with the windows open?” (almost an exact quote)

Congressman Davy Crockett: “Mr. Speaker--I have as much respect for the memory of the deceased, and as much sympathy for the sufferings of the living, if suffering there be, as any man in this House, but we must not permit our respect for the dead or our sympathy for a part of the living to lead us into an act of injustice to the balance of the living. I will not go into an argument to prove that Congress has not the power to appropriate this money as an act of charity. Every member upon this floor knows it. We have the right, as individuals, to give away as much of our own money as we please in charity; but as members of Congress we have no right so to appropriate a dollar of the public money. Some eloquent appeals have been made to us upon the ground that it is a debt due the deceased. Mr. Speaker, the deceased lived long after the close of the war; he was in office to the day of his death, and I have never heard that the government was in arrears to him. Every man in this House knows it is not a debt. We cannot, without the grossest corruption, appropriate this money as the payment of a debt. We have not the semblance of authority to appropriate it as charity. Mr. Speaker, I have said we have the right to give as much money of our own as we please. I am the poorest man on this floor. I cannot vote for this bill, but I will give one week's pay to the object, and if every member of Congress will do the same, it will amount to more than the bill asks.”

Davy Crockett, to his peers, when he had not been elected for a 4^th term: “You all can go to Hell -- I'm going to Texas.”

Davy Crockett: “Remember that a government big enough to give you everything you want is also big enough to take away everything you have.”

Calvin Coolidge (you would think he was talking about GM, FNMA or some other government insertion into free enterprise): “When the government goes into business it lays a tax on everybody else in that business, and uses the money that it collects from its competitors to establish a monopoly and drive them out of business.”

Calvin Coolidge: “The government of a country never gets ahead of the religion of a country. There is no way by which we can substitute the authority of law for the virtue of man. Of course we can help to restrain the vicious and furnish a fair degree of security and protection by legislation and police control, but the real reforms which society in these days is seeking will come as a result of our religious convictions, or they will not come at all.”

Calvin Coolidge: “The wise and correct course to follow in taxation and all other economic legislation is not to destroy those who have already secured success but to create conditions under which every one will have a better chance to be successful.”

Calvin Coolidge: “If we are to have that harmony and tranquility, that union of spirit which is the foundation of real national genius and national progress, we must all realize that there are true Americans who did not happen to be born in our section of the country, who do not attend our place of religious worship, who are not of our racial stock, or who are not proficient in our language. If we are to create on this continent a free republic and an enlightened civilization that will be capable of reflecting the true greatness and glory of mankind, it will be necessary to regard these differences as accidental and unessential.”

Calvin Coolidge: “No matter how it is disguised, the moment the government engages in buying and selling, by that act it is fixing prices.”

Coolidge: “It does not follow that because something ought to be done the national government ought to do it.”

Isn’t it amazing how Silent Cal is someone you heard very little about in school, but you certainly know something about FDR?

Frank Luntz interviewing people in Arizona on the immigration situation (it is on Hannity’s show, but Hannity does not participate):

This is a Democratic ad, attacking the Republican Party by (1) identifying them with the TEA party movement and (2) by stating some of the most extreme TEA party platforms (privatize SS, get rid of the Department of Education and the EPA). They forgot to include get rid of the IRS. When it started listing all of these radical reforms, I found myself thinking, yeah, yeah!

FoxNews had an excellent documentary on this weekend called Honor Killing in America; if you cannot find it on FoxNews, try:

Also, Freedom Watch tonite (check your local listings) will be a discussion of the healthcare bill, recent legislation, and it will feature Karl Rove as one of the commentators.

Speaking of Karl Rove, he will sit in for Rush Limbaugh this Monday (the first time Rove has hosted a radio show).

Pete Stark tells us that the federal government’s power is essentially unlimited (video and story):

59% of Pakistanis see America as an enemy and not as an ally (remember, they have the bomb).

Dennis Miller: “Listen, if they stole Lady Gaga's creativity, trust me, they're going to try that one in small claims court”

Jodi Miller: “The message that president Obama is sending this year is, quote, ‘things could be worse.’ And if Democrats do manage to keep control of Congress this fall, he’ll be proven correct.”

Jodi Miller: “Jeopardy’s Alex Trebec just turned 70 years old and he celebrated by mocking someone who didn’t know the name of Charlemagne’s horse.”

1) The proposed Mosque in New York City, near Ground Zero, was going to be called Cordoba House, until people found out that this refers back to a mosque built where a church once was (actually, the church itself was re-worked into a mosque), before the Muslims conquered the Visigoth Kingdom.

2) In 1970, there were fewer than 10 mosques in NYC; now there are over 100. In Saudi Arabia, there are 900,000 Filipinos (90% Christian), and an estimated 600,000 Keralan Christians from India, and Christians from Africa, Lebanon, and Palestine. However, there are no Christian churches in Saudi Arabia—not one. You may even have your personal Bible confiscated there.

3) A big thumbs up to Karl Rove, he said that Republicans needs to be more forceful when it comes to defining what a maximum tax rate ought to be. Ask most conservatives, and they can usually give you a number (for me, I believe all taxes ought to be limited to 20–30% as a total maximum); however, ask a liberal what ought to be the maximum tax rate and watch them hem and haw, and throw out a few platitudes (platitudes which lack numerical values).

4) Ben Franklin, for the U.S. Seal, suggested "Moses standing on the Shore, and extending his Hand over the Sea, thereby causing the same to overwhelm Pharaoh who is sitting in an open Chariot, a Crown on his Head and a Sword in his Hand. Rays from a Pillar of Fire in the Clouds reaching to Moses, to express that he acts by Command of the Deity." The motto he suggested was, "Rebellion to Tyrants is Obedience to God." Thomas Jefferson suggested a depiction of the Children of Israel in the wilderness, led by a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night for the front of the seal.

5) I do agree that, to some extent, Democrats were full-on progressives and that many Republicans were progressive-lite; however I do not think that is the case any more; and it appears as if a reasonable percentage of Americans have awakened to the state of our nation. For many years, most conservatives were concerned with home, family and their job; and had not paid much attention to what government was doing. As long as the government didn’t get too weird and did not infringe on our liberties, most conservatives didn’t give it much thought. For me, I began to pay attention when I got dozens of vicious, anti-Bush propaganda in my email box. Although I did not quite get it at the time, that was apparently a concerted effort which employed a lot of useful idiots to send this stuff around. It was so vicious and hateful, that it caught my attention. Many others began to pay attention at the 2008 election, and with what President Obama began to do from the beginning of his inauguration. This is how a committed 20% of the electorate managed to get the most radical president ever elected.

6) There are 2 really big issues in the healthcare bill and the legal challenges: (1) Does the commerce clause in the U.S. constitution essentially allow Congress to pass nearly any law that they want. The idea was, the constitution was to restrict the power of the federal government, and the commerce clause has been stretched to all the government to do nearly anything. (2) Can Congress continue to pass along unfunded mandates to the states? Can Congress come up with some thing which they deem worthy, and then go ahead and tell states that they must do these things, no matter what the cost. What happens with both of these issues is going to affect the direction of the United States for the next 20–50 years. I don’t really have a solution for this, but this decision will be made by one man on the Supreme Court (we already know how 8 members of the Supreme Court will rule).

7) I need to backtrack on one thing: I once said that it was not necessarily wise to keep calling Obama a socialist. However, since about 55% of Americans believe that, I need to retract that opinion.

8) I must admit to getting sick and tired of hearing liberal talking heads say that a considerable number of people oppose President Obama based upon race. This can be easily disproven: what is Obama’s favorable ratings? What are the favorable ratings for Congress? If race was a significant factor, then Obama would not rate higher than Congress.

9) According to Vanity Faire, President Obama strolls into work around 9:30 am (President Bush, by contrast, used to get to work around 6 am).

10) Newt Gingrich suggests that a true bridge-builder would put in an interfaith mosque, with a section for a Christian church and another for a Jewish Synagogue. Obviously, that will never happen.

11) What are the chances that a pork-pulled sandwich shop could be established next to the Ground Zero Mosque? That would be the most frequented eatery within 10 blocks.

12) Section 1 of the 14^th Amendment reads: All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. Some conservatives (and others) are beginning to question this law, and whether or not it should be repealed. The idea behind the 14^th Amendment was to make certain that all African-Americans be considered citizens of the United States. However, this has now degenerated into women intentionally having a child in the United States so that they can gain permanent entry into the U.S. through this anchor baby.

13) You may be outraged by taxpayer-saved companies like GM, Chrysler and CitiGroup are using some of their money to buy political influence, but this has been done for a long time. Various groups like NPR and ACORN and other tax-supported entities spread money around to other similar entities and back into the pockets of some politicians. It is wrong, and any organization which receives one red cent from the federal government ought to be barred from giving this money to any other group or to any political cause. I would further like to see them, if they are to run any political ads themselves, that this come from privately donated money given with that expressed purpose.

There are approximately 5000 honor killings throughout the world in any given year. Almost all of these occur in Muslim families.

There will be a 3.8% tax on some real estate transactions as a part of paying for Obamacare. The way I read this in the original bill (and it does not make a lot of sense), if your income + the sale of your home is greater than $250,000 for a couple filing jointly, this 3.8% will apply to that amount which is over $250,000 (although, again, the actual legislation is confusing at this point). Although Snopes covered this, they tend to have a very liberal bias in their fact finding.

131,000 jobs were lost in July 2010 (this is mostly because there were 143,000 census jobs lost and a few private sector jobs gained). If memory serves, we need around 175,000 new jobs each month to stay about even with new job demands.

14.6 million are now unemployed persons, with 1.2 million discouraged workers (those no longer looking for work).

59 years old, the average retirement age of a public worker who will retire with full benefits;

67 years old is the average retirement age of a private worker, retiring with full benefits.

Taxpayers own 60% of GM, and recently, they game $36,000 to the Congressional Black Caucus. Is this how GM should be spending our money?

41% of those surveyed this week approved of the way Obama is handling his job, which is his lowest rating in the USA TODAY/Gallup Poll since he took office in January 2009.

Mainstream media spoke glowingly of President Obama’s birthday (I do not recall ever hearing this about President Bush). At the same time, a Missouri vote which repudiated Obamacare was ignored (there are ballot measures all over the United States like this one).

The alphabet media was all over Bush for any number of job losses, even when unemployment was below 5%. However, unemployment barely rates a mention, now that Obama is president.

Ditto for Obama popularity numbers in the polls. Wolf Blitzer promos (none are repeated): It's 4 p.m. here in Washington. So you're getting the first look right now at our brand-new poll. The president's job approval rating has taken a downward turn again, falling to only 36%. [break] This represents his lowest rating ever in the CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll. [break] The president's poll numbers are pretty bad, pretty awful right now, rock bottom as far as the

CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll. [break] The president's Iraq problem and his new low point in the polls. [break] His approval and policies now are at new lows. [break] The president's job approval number in this new CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll, rock bottom, the lowest it's ever been. [break] It's 5 p.m. here in Washington where President Bush takes a beating in our latest poll. His approval rating at a low ebb. [break] Our latest CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll just out in the past hour shows the president at an all-time low. [break] His job approval rating at a new low. [break] That's rock bottom as far as our poll is concerned. [break] It's 7 p.m. here in Washington. The war in Iraq comes home to roost for President Bush. Our latest poll numbers showing his approval rating at a new low. [break] Also: President Bush hits a new low in the polls. [break] Now back to our lead story: President Bush's approval rating now at an all-time low. [break] As we noted, a new CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll shows his job approval rating at a new low. [break] President Bush's approval rating at a new low, 36%.

Promos being run on CNN and MSNBC concerning Obama’s record low numbers in the polls this week:

Will Democrats blame their losses in November on Charley Rangel and Maxine White? Is that why this is playing out now?

There is a rumor out there that Obama is looking at having FNMA and FHLMC forgive all mortgages which are underwater, in order to secure votes. If they do this, it is going ot be one of the most unpopular moves of all time.

If the mosque near ground zero is built (or even it is not), its nickname will be The Ground Zero Mosque. Obviously, there will be all kinds of problems and demonstrations if building is begun on this mosque, and Bloomberg will bring out the police to quiet things down.

As mentioned earlier, if Obama tries to forgive all mortgages that are underwater, it is going to be one of the most unpopular moves in political history. It will poll at 60–80% against.

I said that Obama had little interest in foreign affairs. There have been reports this week that he is distinctly incurious about international briefings and sometimes cuts them short or blows them off.

The judicial branch of the government is clearly limited by the first section of the constitution: All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives. Those legislative powers are limited by the Bill of Rights, as well as by section 9 and other portions of the constitution.

When any judge or judicial group essentially makes law, modifies a law, assigns rights that did not previously exist, or strikes down a law which does not clearly violate the constitution, it is guilty of judicial overreach. In fact, given what the courts have done over the years as compared to their assigned duties by the constitution, it does not appear that our founding fathers even anticipated that the court would seize the power that they have seized.

One of the areas in which people are confused is, just because the court makes a popular decision, that does not mean they had a right to make that decision. Our government was designed to be slow and clunky. Our government was further designed to be fraught with checks and balances, not just between the 3 branches of the federal government, but between federal, state and local governments.

Changes in civil rights came as a result of Congressional, Presidential and Judicial action. However, in the area of civil rights, the courts had no business getting involved. Now, if some African American was clearly granted this or that right by a Congressional act, and he was prevented from exercising that right, then the courts have a place to act. But, what the courts did—no matter how you feel about civil rights—when it came to granted new rights or interpreting the law in some way or another—was wrong and judicial overreach.

In many cases, the courts should have kicked cases out and said, “Interpretation of this law is unclear, and for us to interpret this law would essentially mean that the courts are making the law.” Then the court would send the law back to Congress, possibly put the law into limbo, possibly make suggestions, and let Congress deal with it. Slow? Absolutely. However, had the courts taken this tact, we would not be in a place where one man—a 75 year old unelected Justice Anthony Kennedy—would be the deciding vote on some of the most important decisions in our lifetime.

I was exposed to the incredible power of the courts where I was a mere Freshman in college, and I knew about zero when it came to politics. I had been raised a spiritual advance liberal, and, like many liberals, I could not understand how anyone could be conservative. My college profession, Gottlieb Baer, was dramatic, argumentative, conservative, and one of the things which I recall from my first semester in his class was, there was this court ruling that said one thing, and then, the same court ruled exactly the opposite a decade or so later. That struck me as weird, which is exactly what Dr. Baer wanted.

Dr. Baer was a great teacher, and although he was not the reason I became a conservative, he opened my eyes to the fact that, there are rational reasons for having a conservative view of life. What he taught me took a few years to gel in my soul.

Here is one of the many ways to distinguish a liberal from a conservative. If the court makes a decision that a liberal likes, they think that is a good thing, no matter what. A conservative may or may not like the decision of a court, but if the court makes a ruling which is essentially legislative in nature, the conservative doesn’t like it, even if he likes the end results of the decision.

This brings us to the latest example of judicial overreach: the striking down of California’s Definition of Marriage Law. The population of California decided what it believed that marriage ought to be (which is the traditional definition of marriage, held by almost all societies for several millennia); that it is between one adult man and one adult female.

This is obviously a moral decision, and, in case you did not know, almost all of our laws are moral decisions. Our society decides, by voting and through our representatives, what we believe to be good and right, and in almost all cases where the people have spoken, they have agreed to civil unions for homosexuals but have drawn the line at same-sex marriage.

The lone judge which struck down California’s law wrote a 130+ page opinion, which is essentially the judge rationalizing why he disagrees with the people of California (who have voted in sync with the rest of the United States). 10 years from now, this may change; 2 years from now, this may change. But Californians made a decision as a sovereign people as to what they judged to be right, and, unless there was a clear violation of one’s rights or of other existing laws, that should have been the end of it. It was not.

For millennia, the concept of marriage has been confined to one man and one woman, which some exceptions of polygamy. However, our nation (and most nations) have ruled out polygamy as a valid form of marriage through legislation, which is right and proper.

The objection cited was, that prop 8 violated The Due Process Clause provides that no “State [shall]

deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.” It ought to be clear that there is nothing stated here about marriage. We have life, liberty and property, and the state cannot deprive us of these things without due process. Our freedom is limited by the law, which looks to balance our freedoms with the freedoms of others, so that, for instance, I cannot force Salma Hayak to marry me, even though I believe that this might be a good example of exercising my freedom. In fact, when it comes to marriage, there is nothing in the due process clause which has anything to do with marriage. Judicial overreach would read into this clause things which are not there and formulate things, like marriage between consenting same-sex couples, which are determined not just to be lawful but which become equivalent to a man/woman marriage. That is judicial overreach, and no sane person can look at the clause and say, “That means, I have the right to marry who has the same genitalia as I have.” This is a point at which, society has a right to choose.

Quoted in this case, and by many people, is, well, what about interracial marriages; people oppose those for a long time. And they did, at various times, in various places in our country (and not since the founding, by the way). Yet, it is not a judge’s choice to declare interracial marriage as some sort of a fundamental or constitutional right. This is something that we, as a society, come to an agreement on. I recall a fellow school employee remarking about an interracial kiss on TV, and how she didn’t think that she liked it very much (this was a few decades ago). If that is where society is at, then so be it. By the way, just because that gal did not like seeing the interracial kiss, it does not mean that she would vote against interracial marriages.

Process matters (a fundamental conservative principle). Society gets to decide what is right and wrong, and, I would not be surprised if gay marriage became accepted by our society. But there is a right way and a wrong way for this to occur. Some judge, imposing his opinion over more than half of Californians, is the wrong way. Dumping this decision in the lap of Justice Kennedy is the wrong way for this to be decided.

The equal protection clause was also cited to support gay marriage: no state shall deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. Again, marriage must be read into this provision, even though that was not the intent of the framers.

What were some of the reasons such an amendment was passed? Proposition 8 is simple and straightforward. Proposition 8 is about preserving marriage; it’s not an attack on the gay lifestyle. It protects our children from being taught in public schools that “same-sex marriage” is the same as traditional marriage..TEACHERS COULD BE REQUIRED to teach young children there is no difference between gay marriage and

traditional marriage. One thing that we know for certain, from actions taken all over the United States, is that there are gay activists doing everything possible to get gay sex into the public schools. Some bring it in under the guise of preventing bullying. In some sex education classes to even elementary school children, they are being taught that there are 3 legitimate forms of intercourse. These are not scare tactics, but stuff which is occurring today in some public schools. So, this is a real concern. Values and morals which directly contradict what most parents teach, and acts which need not be discussed even in high school, have been declared legitimate and necessary by some school districts. And we have seen this escalate dramatically in just a couple of decades.

The point of the arguments for marriage as being defined as being between one man and one woman is, there would be dramatic changes to society far beyond Mitch and Tom living together forever in wedded bliss.

Do we as a society want this? When put to a vote, almost every state has clearly said no.

From time immemorial, marriage has both protected the woman and the children, and has provided a basic framework within which society is stabilized. Studies of single women raising children indicates that, their children are more prone to drugs, underage drinking, teen pregnancy and crime. Those in prison tend to come disproportionately from single-mother families.

So, not only is there a long history of the traditional family, but when it comes to statistics, the traditional family has been shown to be ideal for the raising of children.

Given the complexity of this decision, and all of its ramifications, it ought to be up to California to decide what California deems to be correct and appropriate. It should not be up to a judge, who somehow sees the word marriage in constitutional passages where is it not actually found. In fact, that approach would make me suspect the judge’s own objectivity and/or mental state, yet another reason why this decision is not his to make.

Personally, I see only two solutions, and they may be nearly impossible: the Congress needs to pass an amendment limiting the powers of the court; or, the court needs to, in several landmark decisions, limit its own power. Or both. This would take some very principled men and women to move in this direction. Are such people anywhere on the political scene today?

Some of the reasons given by the defendants who wanted to marry included, being embarrassed when trying to set up a joint bank account for two males and having to endure the question, “Is this a partnership or a company?” One woman was concerned that she did not have a word to describe her relationship with her lover, and needed the marriage title in order of them to feel included “in the social fabric.”

U.S. Senators Tom Coburn, M.D. (R-OK) and John McCain (R-AZ) today released a new oversight report: "Summertime Blues: 100 Stimulus Projects that Give Taxpayers the Blues." The report, a third in a series, highlights questionable stimulus projects that are wasteful, mismanaged, and overall unsuccessful in creating jobs. The projects featured in the report cannot be considered as an investment in long-term priorities to create and sustain economic growth that the Stimulus was designed to do.

"Eighteen months since the passage of the stimulus bill, millions of jobs are still gone and the economy is as uncertain as ever. The only thing getting a boost is our national debt. The stimulus has helped push it 23 percent higher, to $13.2 trillion, a new record."

"We owe it to all Americans that are paying taxes and struggling to find jobs, to rebuild our economy without doing additional harm, and to do it in a way that expands opportunities for future generations. Too many stimulus projects are failing to meet that goal."

"Washington should focus on re-igniting the unmatched power of the American entrepreneurial spirit by sweeping away government red tape, expanding markets for U.S. goods, making it easier for small businesses to obtain credit, and reducing our national debt by eliminating wasteful Washington spending."

"We owe it to every American to rebuild our economy without doing additional harm and in a manner that expands opportunities for future generations of Americans. Job creation should be a national priority, but torrential, misdirected government spending is not the way to do it."

• $554,763 for the Forest Service to replace windows in a closed visitor center at Mount St. Helens

• $62 million for a tunnel to nowhere in Pittsburgh, PA that even Governor, Ed Rendell called "a tragic mistake"

• $3.8 million for a "streetscaping" project that has reduced traffic and caused a business to fire two employees

• $16 million to help Boeing to clean up an environmental mess it created in 2007

• $39.7 million to upgrade the statehouse and political offices in Topeka, Kansas

• $529,648 to study the effects of local populations on the environment in the Himalayas

This Tuesday voters in Missouri, by a 40-point margin, approved a ballot measure rejecting the individual mandate at the core of President Barack Obama's health care law. Asked what the vote meant to the White House, press secretary Robert Gibbs said: "Nothing." Yesterday in San Francisco, federal judge Vaughn Walker gave the exact same weight to a California ballot measure that affirmed marriage as an institution between one man and one woman. Specifically Judge Walker overturned the California Marriage Protection Act after concluding, as a matter of fact, that the majority of Californians who voted to protect marriage were bigots who had no rational basis to define marriage on their own terms. Here are just some of the "facts" Judge Walker found:

● Religious beliefs that gay and lesbian relationships are sinful or inferior to heterosexual relationships harm gays and lesbians.

● The campaign to pass Proposition 8 relied on stereotypes to show that same-sex relationships are inferior to opposite-sex relationships.

● The Proposition 8 campaign relied on fears that children exposed to the concept of same-sex marriage may become gay or lesbian.

● The genetic relationship between a parent and a child is not related to a child's adjustment outcomes.

● Children do not need to be raised by a male parent and a female parent to be well-adjusted.

How did Judge Walker arrive at these "facts"? By agreeing with everything the same-sex marriage proponents' "experts" said while ruling that the traditional marriage witness was "unreliable" and "provided no credible evidence to support any of the claimed adverse effects proponents promised to demonstrate." In so doing, Walker not only ignored the views of millions of Californians, but by basing his decision on the 14th Amendment, he also ignored the factual determinations of every single popular vote that has been held on the issue in the past two decades. According to Judge Walker's reasoning every single one of these Americans is a bigot whose opinion on marriage has no place under Judge Walker's Constitution.

From the beginning, it was clear that Judge Walker was more interested in making a political statement than upholding the rule of law. That is why after Judge Walker ruled that the trial could be broadcast live, the Supreme Court took the remarkable step of overturning his decision, writing in January: "Not only did [Judge Walker's court] ignore the federal statute that establishes the procedures by which its rules may be amended, its express purpose was to broadcast a high-profile trial that would include witness testimony about a contentious issue."

Clearly that Supreme Court would have rightly viewed with great skepticism every sentence of Judge Walker's spurious ruling. But that Court will not be deciding this case. Today the Senate will vote on whether to confirm President Obama's Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan. The same Elena Kagan who manipulated the law and facts to deny military recruiters equal access to Harvard law students because she did not personally approve of our military's personnel policies regarding same-sex relationships.

The same Elena Kagan who was simply "not sympathetic" to the claim of a petitioner that his 2nd amendment rights were violated, and was actively involved in President Clinton's gun control agenda. The same Elena Kagan who advised President Clinton that it would be a "disaster" if the full medical truth was revealed about partial-birth abortion, endangering the gruesome procedure.

The facts are becoming quite clear. Kagan, Walker, Gibbs, and Obama all give the same weight to the will of the American people as expressed at the ballot box: "Nothing." We'll see today if the Senate agrees.

Homosexuals hijack political process for their own ends (from the Washington Post)

A homosexual judge branded 7,001,084 California voters as hateful people on Wednesday. In so doing, Vaughn R. Walker, a man never elected to his lifetime position, decided he would reshape the state to better suit his personal lifestyle preference. In striking down Proposition 8's simple statement that, "Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in California," Judge Vaughn undermined not just the political process, but society itself.

At the heart of the matter is the belief of the chief judge of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California that there is no problem with Heather having two mommies. Those who do have a problem with such arrangements, in his words, can only be motivated by irrational "fear" and "animus." By discarding the possibility that centuries of tradition might have a rational basis, Judge Vaughn declared Proposition 8 cannot be allowed to interfere with homosexuals' "fundamental right to marry under the Due Process Clause."

The claim is that no government interest could be found in preferring the union of traditional couples to that of homosexual couples. "The evidence did not show any historical purpose for excluding same-sex couples from marriage, as states have never required spouses to have an ability or willingness to procreate in order to marry," Mr. Vaughn asserted. "Rather, the exclusion exists as an artifact of a time when the genders were seen as having distinct roles in society and in marriage. That time has passed."

With a swish of his pen, Judge Vaughn discarded the most fundamental of all government interests - the preservation of society itself. If everyone were to adopt the lifestyle choice that Judge Vaughn deemed harmless, within a matter of generations society would be extinct. While not all traditional marriages involve the raising of families, most do, and promoting this positive outcome falls among the most basic duties of government. When Judge Vaughn divorces marriage from the raising of biological families, he sets the stage for an "anything goes" social order.

Judge Vaughn's social experiment is nothing new. Ancient Rome's brutal emperor Nero is known to history as one of the earliest practitioners of a same-sex partnership that carried the sanction of the state. As the historian Suetonius described, Nero took a boy and "endeavored to transform him into a woman, he even went so far as to marry him with all the usual formalities of a marriage settlement."

With the power to impose laws contrary to popular will, Nero, like Judge Vaughn, wanted the community to embrace his unnatural way of life. It didn't last long. In the contemporary case, there is little doubt that the U.S. Supreme Court will eventually utter the final verdict on California's Proposition 8, hopefully rejecting Judge Vaughn's transparent activism. It is not the business of one man - or one set of nine - to reshape society to suit his fancy.

In the days leading up to the dramatic late-night vote on President Barack Obama's health plan, Speaker Nancy Pelosi said, "We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it ." Now that ObamaCare has passed, it is slowly dawning on people what the new law means for the country and for Washington state.

ObamaCare sweeps away a host of state regulations and permanently alters our state's insurance market. From now on, the federal government will manage the health care of all Washingtonians. The 2,700-page law contains a complex web of mandates, directives, price controls, tax increases and subsidies.

Federal officials will now decide what kind of insurance people in Washington must have, what medicines will be covered, what treatments are allowed and which are not. Early reports indicate, however, that President Obama, Vice President Biden, the Cabinet, senior members of Congress and leadership staff are exempt.

The new law falls well short of universal coverage. ObamaCare will leave about 6 percent of Washington residents without coverage. The measure is conservatively expected to cost $2.4 trillion in its first full decade. Thousands of older Washingtonians will lose their Medicare Advantage coverage, and the state's 120,000 Health Savings Account holders may need to buy new policies or face stiff penalties.

Washington residents will begin paying ObamaCare taxes this year, while most benefits don't start until 2014. The law includes some 19 new taxes. Here's a rundown of what Washingtonians can expect in the coming years.

Penalties on individuals. Individuals will pay a yearly penalty of $695, or up to 2.5 percent of their annual income, if they cannot show they have purchased a government-approved health policy.

Penalties on families. Families will pay a yearly penalty of $347 per child, up to $2,250 per family, if parents cannot show they have purchased a government- approved policy.

Penalties on employers. Business owners with more than 50 employees must buy government- acceptable health coverage or pay a yearly penalty of $2,000 per employee if at least one employee receives a tax credit.

Tax on investment income. ObamaCare imposes a 3.8 percent annual tax on investment income of individuals making $200,000 or more and on families making $250,000 or more. The new tax is not indexed to inflation, so more people will fall under it each year. Seniors on fixed incomes and people with IRAs and 401(k) plans will be hit particularly hard.

Tax on "Cadillac" health plans. Starting in 2018, imposes a 40 percent annual tax on health care plans valued at $10,200 for individuals and $27,500 for families.

Medicare tax increase. Requires single people earning $200,000 or more and couples earning $250,000 or more to pay an additional 0.9 percent in Medicare taxes.

Tax on Home Sales. Imposes a 3.8 percent tax on home sales and other real estate transactions. Middle-income people must pay the full tax even if they are "rich" for only one day - the day they sell their house and buy a new one.

Tax on medical aid devices. Creates a new 2.9 percent tax on medical aid devices. Certain items intended for personal use are exempt.

Tax on tanning. Imposes a 10 percent tax on services at tanning salons. Business owners will collect the tax from customers and send it to the federal government. This appears to be the first federal sales tax in the United States.

ObamaCare will be enforced by the Internal Revenue Service. The tax agency plans to hire 16,500 new auditors, agents and investigators, and to increase enforcement audits. The IRS can confiscate tax refunds, place liens on property and seek jail time if health-related penalties and taxes are not paid.

President Obama had said people could keep their coverage if they want, yet the Congressional Budget Office estimates that under ObamaCare 8 million to 9 million people will lose their employer-provided coverage.

The ObamaCare law passed over bipartisan opposition in Congress. Republicans say they will run on a "repeal and replace" platform this fall, and Washington has joined 12 other states in a lawsuit challenging the federal government's power to force state residents to buy a product - insurance - from private companies. The long-term prospects of ObamaCare are unclear. In the meantime, Washingtonians should prepare for major changes in their tax burden.

On top of this, you will have to purchase a government-approved healthcare policy, and they do not allow you to purchase high deductible catastrophic healthcare insurance.

This is an amazing story that you most likely will see nowhere else but "The Factor."

As you may know, President Obama and CIA chief Leon Panetta have wreaked havoc in the ranks of Al Qaeda by using predator drone missiles to attack terrorists all over the world. The strategy has been very effective and has decimated the Al Qaeda leadership. Obama and Panetta are patriots for their actions.

But the far left opposes using the drone attacks, and now the ACLU has filed a backdoor lawsuit to try to stop the campaign.

Anwar al-Awlaki has been designated a global terrorist by the U.S. government. That means he is a prime target.

LEON PANETTA, CIA DIRECTOR: Awlaki is a terrorist. And, yes, he's a U.S. citizen, but he is first and foremost a terrorist, and we're going to treat him like a terrorist. We don't have an assassination list. But I can tell you this: We have a terrorist list and he's on it.

Enter the ACLU, which has applied to represent Awlaki in any court proceedings that might occur. That application has not been acted upon by the U.S. government.

So the ACLU is suing in federal court, saying the terrorist and others like him are being denied due process because they are attacked by U.S. authorities without warning.

In other words, the ACLU wants designated terrorists to be given rights before any action is taken against them.

If the ACLU succeeds, that would limit predator drone targets. It's simply unbelievable.

The ACLU has always been a far-left outfit, but is now actively aiding terrorists, actively helping Al Qaeda thugs who kill people all over the world.

The ACLU and other far-left groups simply will not acknowledge there is a war going on. They see terrorism as criminal activity, not a military battle.

If the ACLU had its way, President Obama and CIA chief Panetta would not be allowed to launch predator attacks.

So I ask you: How many Americans do you believe support the ACLU's actions? Five percent? Maybe 10? But you don't hear a word in the media about the ACLU's subversive activities, even when they are trying to help the Al Qaeda leadership.

In a free society, there is nothing we can do. The ACLU has a right to exist, but I have a right to expose it. That organization is putting every single American in danger. It's disgraceful.

While Tea Party activists are more likely to favor Republicans than Democrats in November's elections, they're increasingly disinclined to affiliate themselves with the GOP, according to a new study by the Sam Adams Alliance.

"Early adopters" - the first to become part of the Tea Party movement - were 81 percent Republican but now only 51 percent identify themselves as part of the GOP, according to a survey of 222 activists.

There was a similar fall-off among "next wave" Tea Party activists, with former Republicans now likely to identify themselves as independents, Libertarians, or as members of the Tea Party.

"This is something very ominous for the Republican Party," said Sam Adams Alliance's Anne M. Sorock. "Republicans may get their vote this time and they may get their vote next time, but Tea Party activists aren't going to help them build their party."

A full 100 percent of respondents gave the national Democratic Party "unfavorable" or "very unfavorable" ratings, while the GOP got a 44 percent "unfavorable" or "very unfavorable" rating. Both parties fared just slightly better on the state level.

•While the Tea Party movement lost its battle to defeat Democrats' health-reform plan, the setback had a motivating effect and helped recruit new participants.

•Nearly 75 percent of activists surveyed said the movement is gaining momentum.

•Of those surveyed, 96 percent said the movement does not have one clear leader - and 94 percent said it shouldn't have a clear leader.

•Sarah Palin was easily the top pick among respondents for 2012 president, but she was named by less than 20 percent of respondents.

The study was not scientifically vetted to apply to all Tea Party participants, but was intended to provide "insight into a large sample of Tea Party activists who span both the Early Adopters and Next Wave activist segments."

The Chicago-based Sam Adams Alliance is a non-partisan, non-profit group formed in 2008 to encourage citizen activism.

This is worth checking out, to see some of the comments, like one from ONRAGE, who writes:

The Teab@aggers are now the party of hate; instead of being constructive, they just gather and hate.

Silent Cal Speaks: Why Calvin Coolidge is the Model for Conservative Leadership Today

The Republican National Convention of 1924 nominated Calvin Coolidge as its candidate for a full four-year term as President. You'll recall that Coolidge had assumed the presidency following the death of Warren Harding.

As one who has covered and commented on several political conventions, that 1924 convention in Cleveland did not yield many good stories.

It is generally remembered as the most uninteresting convention in Republican history. Delegates didn't bother showing up at many of the sessions. The most popular drink was a keep-cool-with-Coolidge highball, composed of raw eggs and fruit juice. Will Rogers suggested that the city of Cleveland "open up the churches to liven things up a bit."

But this is a reminder that politics, in the end, is not about drama but about principle, not about charisma but about character. I doubt Republicans will get a nominee out of San Diego with so many wise and principled things to say about the deficit, about tax cuts, and about welfare dependence as they had in 1924. And I very much doubt he will beat this opponent by a landslide of 54 percent to 28 percent.

I have always had a particular respect for the 30th President, not entirely explained by the ties of family.

Calvin Coolidge had a certain style and attitude toward public service. He seemed immune to the pretensions of politics. When asked his goals as Governor of Massachusetts, he explained, "to walk humbly and discharge my obligations." It is hard to imagine a better definition of public service. When one woman admirer asked if the burdens of the presidency were more than a man could endure, Coolidge replied, "Oh, I don't know. There are only so many hours in the day, and one can do the best he can in the time he's got. When I was mayor of Northampton I was pretty busy most of the time, and I don't seem to be much busier here." There is something profoundly refreshing about a leader with that kind of perspective on life and politics. When Coolidge left the presidency he told reporters, "Perhaps one of the most important accomplishments of my administration has been minding my own business."

I have always admired Coolidge's political courage. He came to national prominence, of course, by breaking the 1919 police strike. Some people don't understand that this was controversial even in his own party. When he was about to sign the order calling out the National Guard, some colleagues warned him that it might destroy the Republican Party in Massachusetts and end his political career. Governor Coolidge took the pen and said quietly, "Perhaps you are right," then signed the document. No grandstanding. Just quiet strength.

Coolidge also showed real humanity beneath his inflexible exterior. I've always been moved by the story of how Coolidge, in the summer of 1924, crawled on his hands and knees to catch a rabbit to show his dying son. He later said, "When he was suffering he begged me to help him. I could not." In that tragedy, he provided a model of dignified grief.

And Coolidge, of course, was always a source of great stories. Everyone has his favorites. Once a man, riding with Coolidge through Vermont, commented, "See how closely they have shaved those sheep?" "At least on this side," said the President.

At another point, a rude, combative man came up to Coolidge and said, "I didn't vote for you." The President immediately replied: "Someone did."

In some ways, I think that Calvin Coolidge misled people into thinking he was less thoughtful and astute than he actually was. He never set out to impress -- a quality of character almost unique in politics. He would have liked the praise of one country shopkeeper, "That young chap Coolidge certainly has more stuff on the shelves and outs less in the show-window than any fellow I've ever seen."

You would think that a President with this kind of character and personality would be widely respected and fondly remembered. In fact, in his own time, he was one of the most popular men ever to occupy the White House.

But the attempts to malign Coolidge -- the historical slander -- began early. H. L. Menken called him "petty and dull." Franklin Roosevelt never tired of attacking the "Coolidge Prosperity," as though it were false and empty.

The history books quickly took up the cause. Historian Henry Steele Commanger wrote:

The idealism of the Wilson era was in the past; the Rooseveltian passion for humanitarian reform was in the future. The decade of the twenties was dull, bourgeois and ruthless. "The business of America is business," said President Coolidge succinctly, and the observation was apt if not profound...never before, not even in the McKinley era, had American society been so materialistic.

Historian Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., wrote in The Crisis of the Old Order, "But, for Coolidge, business was more than business; it was a religion; and to it he committed all the passion of his arid nature...as he worshipped business, so he detested government. Economy was his self-confessed obsession."

None of this venom can be explained by the real-world results of the Coolidge Administration. The federal budget shrank. The national debt was cut almost in half. Unemployment stood at 3.6 percent. Consumer prices rose at just 0.4 percent. During his term, there was a remarkable 17.5 percent increase in the nation's wealth. Total education spending in the United States rose fourfold. In the 1920s, illiteracy fell nearly in half. This was a golden age, by any standard.

There must be some other reason that Coolidge is controversial. He has not been forgotten -- like Chester Arthur or Millard Fillmore -- he has been actively vilified by certain historians. In my view, this is not because he was "dull" or "arid," but because his ideas were important -- and even threatening to some. He is attacked precisely because he is a figure who speaks beyond his time.

Calvin Coolidge, known for his reticence, was actually the most articulate conservative who ever served as President. He was, as British historian Paul Johnson comments, "internally consistent and single-minded." If his views are right, much of modern political thinking -- from FDR to Bill Clinton -- is profoundly wrong. This is why he continues to be relevant.

Coolidge was sometimes criticized for stating and restating the obvious. It was he who said, "When a great many people are unable to find work, unemployment results." Actually Calvin Coolidge was in a constant search for foundational principles -- the bedrock convictions that explain everything else. His points were not simply obvious, they were fundamental. Johnson concludes, "No public man carried into modern times more comprehensively the founding principles of Americanism: hard work, frugality, freedom of conscience, freedom from government, respect for serious culture."

"They criticize me," Coolidge said, "for harping on the obvious. Perhaps someday I'll write On the Importance of the Obvious. If all the folks in the United States would do the few simple things they know they ought to do, most of our big problems would take care of themselves."

Our nation is constantly in search of new ideas and new solutions. It is desperate for answers and obsessed with innovation. But Coolidge's message was very different. He urged his fellow citizens to examine the basics of their beliefs. He called their attention to the proven principles of our political tradition. This is the reason his views, opinions, and advice seem so current. Those who set out to be "new" and "modern" are quickly outdated. Those who call attention to the permanent things are always fresh.

The 1990s would be wise to listen to this voice for the 1920s, speaking about principles that never age.

● Coolidge talked honestly about the nature of wealth and of individual responsibility.

He told the Massachusetts Senate in 1914, "Government cannot relieve from toil. The normal must take care of themselves. Self-government means self-support.... Ultimately property rights and personal rights are the same thing.... History reveals no civilized people among whom there was not a highly educated class and large aggregations of wealth. Large profits mean large payrolls."

The goal of public policy, in Coolidge's view, was not to redistribute wealth, but to create it. "After all," he said, "there is but a fixed quantity of wealth in this country at any fixed time. The only way that we can all secure more of it is to create more."

Coolidge also saw that there is a tie between wealth, individual character, and social progress. "Wealth is the product of industry, ambition, character and untiring effort. In all experience, the accumulation of wealth means the multiplication of schools, the increase of knowledge, the dissemination of intelligence, the encouragement of science, the broadening of outlook, the expansion of liberty, the widening of culture."

"I favor the policy of economy," he said, "not because I wish to save money, but because I wish to save people. The men and women of this country who toil are the ones who bear the cost of the government. Every dollar we carelessly waste means that their life will be so much the more meager. Every dollar that we prudently save means that their life will be so much the more abundant. Economy is idealism in its most practical form."

● President Coolidge was opposed to the easy, false promise that we can pay for larger government by taxing "the rich" -- the temptation of class warfare we still see today.

He argued, “The fallacy of the claim that the costs of government are borne by the rich cannot be too often exposed. No system has been devised, I do not think any system could be devised, under which any person living in this country could escape being affected by the cost of our government. It has a direct effect both upon the rate and the purchasing power of wages. It is felt in the price of those prime necessities of existence, food, clothing, fuel and shelter...the continuing costs of public administration can be met in only one way -- by the work of the people. The higher they become, the more the people must work for the government. The less they are, the more the people can work for themselves.”

In some ways, President Coolidge was a supply-sider before his time. He understood that high tax rates do not always mean higher tax revenues. Taxes can constrict economic activity, leaving less profit and income to tax. "The method of raising revenue," he argued, “ought not to impede the transition of business; it ought to encourage it. I am opposed to extremely high rates, because they produce little or no revenue, because they are bad for the country, and, finally, because they are wrong. We cannot finance the country, we cannot improve social conditions, through any system of injustice, even if we attempt to influence it upon the rich.... The wise and correct course to follow in taxation and in all other economic legislation is not to destroy those who have already secured success but to create conditions under which every one will have a better chance to be successful.”

That is sound, practical, principled advice for any time. In his own time, it was dramatically effective. The Revenue Act of 1926 -- engineered along with Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon -- was a stunning success. In 1922, the effective tax rate on the wealthy was 50 percent, who paid a total of $77 million into the Treasury. By 1927, Coolidge had cut their tax rate to 20 percent -- but the same group paid $230 million in taxes. Meanwhile, the total tax burden on people making less than $10,000 fell from $130 million in 1923 to less than $20 million in 1929.

● Calvin Coolidge talked with eloquence about human nature and limits on social engineering.

He believed it was impossible to change the world suddenly because it was impossible to suddenly change human behavior. In his inaugural address, he said, "We must realize that human nature is about the most constant thing in the universe and that the essentials of human relationship do not change. We must frequently take our bearings from these fixed stars of our political firmament if we expect to hold a true course."

● And Calvin Coolidge was also convinced that the ultimate strength of a government, an economy and a society depends on moral and religious values.

In no way was Coolidge a materialist. In the same speech in which he famously said, "The chief business of the American people is business," Coolidge also argued, "The accumulation of wealth cannot be justified as the chief end of existence." Elsewhere he noted, "Industry, thrift and self-control are not sought because they create wealth, but because they create character."

No society, he believed, can be prosperous or successful in the absence of moral conviction. In essence, the common good requires that goodness be common. "Mere intelligence," he said, "is not enough. Enlightenment must be accompanied by that moral power which is the product of home and religion. Real education and true welfare for the people rest inevitably on this foundation, which the government can approve and command, but which the people themselves must create."

Coolidge was committed to religious freedom, stating that the "fundamental precept of liberty is toleration." But he also noted, "The foundations of our society and our government rest so much on the teachings of the Bible that it would be difficult to support them if faith in these teachings would cease to be practically universal in our country."

These ideas represent more than a practical political approach. They are a coherent, consistent view of the world, rooted in a philosophy about God, man, and government. This is something rare in an American President -- something we see only in figures like Jefferson and Lincoln.

I think it can be argued that the two seminal, symbolic figures in America during the early twentieth century were Calvin Coolidge and Franklin Roosevelt. They represented visions larger than their own lives -- fundamentally different directions for our national experiment.

Roosevelt spoke of the need for "bold, persistent experimentation." He established a tradition of liberal tinkering with American society that reaches through history to our current administration. A health care plan that attempted to nationalize one-seventh of the U.S. economy is a clear descendant of this approach.

Calvin Coolidge is the polar opposite. His philosophy of government and of life is summarized in an extraordinary speech, given in 1926 at the 150th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. It may be the finest, richest speech given by an American President in this century. "Under a system of popular government," he said, “there will always be those who will seek for political preferment by clamoring for reform. While there is very little of this which is not sincere, there is a large portion that is not well-informed. In my opinion very little of just criticism can attach to the theories and principles of our institutions. There is far more danger of harm than there is hope of good in any radical changes.”

What we need instead, Coolidge contended, is a "better knowledge of the foundations of government in general." Once again, he was talking about foundations -- always the basics.

Those foundations, in the history of our country, were not material, but spiritual. Our nation's founders "were a people who came under the influence of a great spiritual development and acquired a great moral power."

"No other theory is adequate to explain or comprehend the Declaration of Independence," he said. “It is the product of the spiritual insight of the people. We live in an age of science and of abounding accumulation of material things. These did not create our Declaration. Our Declaration created them. The things of the spirit come first. Unless we cling to that, all our material prosperity, overwhelming though it may appear, will turn to a barren scepter in our grasp. If we are to maintain the great heritage which has been bequeathed to us, we must be like-minded as the fathers who created it. We must not sink into pagan materialism. We must cultivate the reverence which they had for the things which are holy. We must follow the spiritual and moral leadership which they showed.”

For Coolidge this was not empty patriotism. It was a continual challenge, reissued in every generation: “Equality, liberty, popular sovereignty, the rights of man -- these are not elements which we can see and touch. They are ideals. They have their source and their roots in religious convictions. They belong to the unseen world. Unless the faith of the American people in these religious convictions is to endure, the principles of our Declaration will perish. We cannot continue to enjoy the result if we neglect and abandon the cause.”

Coolidge concluded that our first, most important task as a nation is not to seek new ideas, but to return to old ideals: “It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance of the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern. But that reasoning cannot be applied to [the Declaration of Independence]. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. If governments derive their just power from the consent of the governed, that is final. No advance, no progress can be

made beyond these propositions. If anyone wishes to deny their truth and their soundness, the only direction in which he can proceed historically is not forward, but backward toward the time when there was not equality, not rights of the individual, no rule of the people. Those who wish to proceed in that direction cannot lay claim to progress. They are reactionary.”

Our century has proven Coolidge to be exactly right. The greatest revolution of our time -- defeating a totalitarian empire -- was the ringing reaffirmation of ideas familiar in Philadelphia in 1776. It is socialism -- which claimed history as its own -- that now seems reactionary. It is American liberalism that seems old and tired.

In the 1940s, Arthur Schlesinger wrote, "There seems no inherent obstacle to the gradual advance of socialism in the United States through a series of New Deals." But, with the perspective of history, they have advanced toward exhaustion -- toward dependence and spiritual decay. We forgot about the nature of man and the limits of government. We neglected that the "things of the spirit come first." Calvin Coolidge would have found these things obvious. If only they had been obvious to us.

Let me conclude with a statement by Coolidge that has never been more current and relevant.

We do not need more intellectual power, we need more moral power. We do not need more knowledge, we need more character. We do not need more government, we need more culture. We do not need more law, we need more religion. We do not need more of the things that are seen, we need more of the things that are unseen. If the foundation be firm, the foundation will stand.

I would add only that we also need to be graced by leaders of Calvin Coolidge's stature again.

THE devastation wrought by the great recession is still all too real for millions of Americans who lost their jobs, businesses and homes. The scars of the crisis are fresh, and every new economic report brings another wave of anxiety. That uncertainty is understandable, but a review of recent data on the American economy shows that we are on a path back to growth.

The recession that began in late 2007 was extraordinarily severe, but the actions we took at its height to stimulate the economy helped arrest the freefall, preventing an even deeper collapse and putting the economy on the road to recovery.

From the start, President Obama made clear that recovery from a crisis of this magnitude would not come quickly and that the recovery would not follow a straight line. We saw that this past spring, when the European fiscal crisis posed a serious challenge to the markets and to business confidence, dampening investment and the rate of growth here.

While the economy has a long way to go before reaching its full potential, last week's data on economic growth show that large parts of the private sector continue to strengthen. Business investment and consumption - the two keys to private demand - are getting stronger, better than last year and better than last quarter. Uncertainty is still inhibiting investment, but business capital spending increased at a solid annual rate of about 17 percent.

Together, private consumption and fixed investment contributed about 3.25 percent to growth. Even the surge in imports, which lowered the rate of increase of G.D.P., actually reflects healthy and growing American demand.

As the economists Ken Rogoff and Carmen Reinhart have written, recoveries that follow financial crises are typically a hard climb. That is reality. The process of repair means economic growth will come slower than we would like. But despite these challenges, there is good news to report:

• Exports are booming because American companies are very competitive and lead the world in many high-tech industries.

• Private job growth has returned - not as fast as we would like, but at an earlier stage of this recovery than in the last two recoveries. Manufacturing has generated 136,000 new jobs in the past six months.

• Businesses have repaired their balance sheets and are now in a strong financial position to reinvest and grow.

• American families are saving more, paying down their debt and borrowing more responsibly. This has been a necessary adjustment because the borrow-and-spend path we were on wasn't sustainable.

• The auto industry is coming back, and the Big Three - Chrysler, Ford and General Motors - are now leaner, generating profits despite lower annual sales.

• Major banks, forced by the stress tests to raise capital and open their books, are stronger and more competitive. Now, as businesses expand again, our banks are better positioned to finance growth.

• The government's investment in banks has already earned more than $20 billion in profits for taxpayers, and the TARP program will be out of business earlier than expected - and costing nearly a quarter of a trillion dollars less than projected last year.

We all understand and appreciate that these signs of strength in parts of the economy are cold comfort to those Americans still looking for work and to those industries, like construction, hit hardest by the crisis. But these economic measures, nonetheless, do represent an encouraging turnaround from the frightening future we faced just 18 months ago.

The new data show that this recession was even deeper than previously estimated. The plunge in economic activity started an entire year before President Obama took office and was accelerating at the end of 2008, when G.D.P. fell at an annual rate of roughly 7 percent.

Panicked by the collapse in demand and financing and fearing a prolonged slump, the private sector cut payrolls and investment savagely. The rate of job loss worsened with time: by early last year, 750,000 jobs vanished every month. The economic collapse drove tax revenue down, pushing the annual deficit up to $1.3 trillion by last January.

The economic rescue package that President Obama put in place was essential to turning the economy around. The combined effect of government actions taken over the past two years - the stimulus package, the stress tests and recapitalization of the banks, the restructuring of the American car industry and the many steps taken by the Federal Reserve - were extremely effective in stopping the freefall and restarting the economy.

According to a report released last week by Alan Blinder and Mark Zandi, advisers to President Bill Clinton and Senator John McCain, respectively, the combined actions since the fall of 2007 of the Federal Reserve, the White House and Congress helped save 8.5 million jobs and increased gross domestic product by 6.5 percent relative to what would have happened had we done nothing. The study showed that government action delivered a powerful bang for the buck, and that the bank rescue on its own will turn a profit for taxpayers.

We have a long way to go to address the fiscal trauma and damage across the country, and we will need to monitor the ups and downs in the economy month by month. The share of workers who have been unemployed for six months or more is at its highest level since 1948, when the data was first recorded, and we must do more to ensure that they have the skills they need to re-enter the 21st-century economy. Small businesses are still battling a tough climate. State and local governments are still hurting.

There are urgent tasks to be undertaken to reinforce the recovery, and Congress should move now to help small business, to assist states in keeping teachers in the classroom, to increase investments in public infrastructure, to promote clean energy and to increase exports. And while making smart, targeted investments in our future, we must also cut the deficit over the next few years and make sure that America once again lives within its means.

These are considerable challenges, but we are in a much stronger position to face them today than when President Obama took office. By taking aggressive action to fix the financial system, reduce growth in health care costs and improve education, we have put the American economy on a firmer foundation for future growth.

And as the president said last week, no one should bet against the American worker, American business and American ingenuity.

They are beginning to walk this story back, just a little bit, saying that the NY Times gave this story its title (a better choice than Economy: Mission Accomplished).

Adrianna Huffington is upset because of Sarah Palin’s use of symbolism (which confuses and sways us, her mind-numbed followers). Now, bear in mind this is that same Sarah Palin who is decried as stupid, yet, somehow, very clever when it comes to the use of symbolism. Oh, one more thing: this complaint comes from supporter of Obama, whose use of symbolism in the previous election was revolutionary (pun intended).

A 74 page pdf document of the waste in the stimulus bill (100 projects are listed):

Al Neuharth, USA TODAY Founder, called Rush Limbaugh’s show the best comedy show on radio.

RUSH: Steven in Omaha, it's great to have you on Open Line Friday, welcome, sir.

CALLER: Hello, Rush. I'm glad to talk to you. I'll be real quick. I had two points to make. In July of '09 President Obama gave a speech at the NAACP where he went on at great length about the Jim Crow South. He neglected to mention a few things. One is that it is a Democrat Party itself which is the party of Jim Crow. George Wallace, Orval Faubus, Strom Thurman, Fulbright, Bull Connor. They were all Democrats.

CALLER: It is the Democratic Party that is the party of all the whips and the chains and they lynch rope. It is the Republican Party, which incidentally grew out of the abolitionist movement, which is the party of economic and physical freedom. The party of Abraham Lincoln.

CALLER: It's the party of Abraham Lincoln who set the slaves free, and Ronald Reagan which set the economy free. The second point I'd like the make is that the Democratic Party still feels the same way about black Americans today as they did as they did in the Antebellum South. They just use different methods of control. They can no longer physically control blacks. So they use economic methods to keep them in line. They still feel that blacks need to be controlled and suppressed, that they can't quite make it on their own. This accounts for things like affirmative action, which has become a permanent program, and welfare. They just feel blacks can't make it on their own, that they need to be controlled, suppressed and help them along.

RUSH: No, I can't disagree with any of it. I have been saying it for 20 years. They have done more than just keep them poor. The Democrat Party has blown up the black family. The Democrat Party has destroyed it. The Democrat Party has allowed the dissolution of the nuclear family in the black community. The Democrat Party purposely -- and it's not just the blacks. It's every constituent group they have. Dumb them down, keep them poor, keep them dependent, and somehow use the media to blame the Republicans for all these people's lot in life. Blame the Republicans for it. The guy is exactly right. All these were Democrats in the civil rights days that opposed civil rights. They were Democrats. Bull Conner, Democrat. Lester Maddox, Democrat. George Wallace, Democrat. J. William Fulbright, Democrat.

If it wasn't for a greater percentage of Republican senators in 1964 voting for the Civil Rights Act than Democrats, it would not have passed. Robert Byrd, an actual Grand Kleagle, was a Democrat in good standing and at his funeral Bill Clinton goes out there to do a eulogy and says (impression), "Yeah, there are some things that Bob did in his past he wasn't proud of. But look where he came from. He came from the hills and hollers o'West Virginia. You know, he made some mistakes and spent the risk of his life atoning for those. But I tell you what: He had to get elected. He became a member of the Klan for you! He didn't want to become a member of the Klan but he knew that is what he had to do to get elected in the racist state of West Virginia."

Clinton didn't use those words but he did say (doing impression), "Uh, he had to get elected. He came from the hills and the hollers of West Virginia! Everybody knew the Klan was running around that state. What do you think he is going do, Limbaugh, in order to get elected? He's got to run! He's gotta go out and join the Klan to get elected in order to do his good work of supportin' health care!" So they will go out of their way to eulogize and excuse KLAN MEMBERS, and somehow always end up blaming the Republicans for being the racists and the sexists. The plantation days are still alive and thriving. The white plantation is still alive. It's just that it's in Washington and being run by the Democrats. There's no question about it. This guy is absolutely right. I'm glad to hear somebody actually call and actually say it besides me. It may be taking hold out there.

RUSH: Rasmussen Reports has a poll out: "Eighty-six percent (86%) of voters nationwide say there should be 'limits on what the federal government can do.'" Now, 86 percent? I haven't seen a poll with 86 percent in anything. But there already is. It's called the United States Constitution. The United States Constitution was written specifically and expressly to limit what the federal government can do. Now, if this 86 percent thinks that we need to limit what government can do, it's obviously because they are noticing what this regime is doing -- which is a positive. But I mean, it's -- I don't know -- a little depressing to me to hear a poll, 86 percent think "there should be 'limits on what the federal government can do,'" when there already are. One of the most brilliant documents every written limits what the government can do.

In this Rasmussen poll 9% want no limits on what the government can do. Nine percent. That is, when you stop and think about that, that is the extent of support that Obama has. Nine percent! It is this kind of minority that is ruling us. It's just amazing. Job growth remains... Here is Obama on television on an economic outing, talking about all the jobs that have been "created." All of the month-by-month jobs that have been created because of his policies. We are not in a "recovery," folks, we are on life-support in this country. Now, I'm okay with math, semi literate with math (numbers are not my strong suit), but I'm having a hard time squaring a numerical loss of jobs with all this talk of "weak" recovery and "job growth."

This headline, this is the Politico: "Job Growth Remains Week." What job growth? I admit I'm weak on numbers, but when the job numbers are the fact that 131,000 jobs were lost in July, where is the growth? I don't understand. "The unemployment rate held steady at 9.5%%." It's actually 15-16 percent, and everybody living life understands this. The regime is doing everything it can to keep that number below ten. That is the tipping point. If that number gets to ten or goes over it, then they think they have a problem. "Overall, the Labor Department reported, nonfarm payroll employment fell 131,000 in July and the unemployment rate held steady at 9.5 percent. The job losses included the elimination of 143,000 temporary census workers. The jobs report for June was revised sharply lower."

Everything we were told in June about job growth was a lie. "Payrolls actually fell 221,000 during the month [of June] rather than the previously reported decline of 125,000," but that is not the number they were all using. The partisan political operative media was talking about 31,000 jobs created in June! Remember that? Thirty-one thousand jobs were created. They didn't talk about the 125,000 that were lost which now is 221,000. "The private sector created only 31,000 jobs in June, not the 83,000 previously reported." So I'm having a tough time understanding the numerical loss of jobs with the talk of a "weak" recovery, or any kind of a recovery, or this Politico headline: "Job Growth Remains Weak." I have actually a couple of news stories here. Reuters is one.

"Employment fell for a second straight month in July as more temporary census jobs ended while private hiring rose less than expected, pointing to an anemic economic recovery." Employment fell two consecutive months. How can we have a "weak recovery"? We are on life support. We don't have a recovery. If I were running, of course, news organizations, I would say, "We're all mired in a slow economic decline that is being managed artfully by the regime." At this rate, folks, our economy is going to be weakly recovering on its way to a depression. "Job Growth Remains Weak." The partisan political operatives in the old media have a strange way of communicating with us. I would have said, "Private sector job growth remains dangerously weak given the administration's trillion dollar stimulus bill."

Aaaaall the stimulus that we have had? Obama has been lying through his teeth about all the jobs that have been created. How do you lose 131,000 jobs in July and still have unemployment be 9.5%? None of these numbers make any sense whatsoever -- and we have had all the stimulus, and we have had all of these bailouts, and we're still losing jobs. You know, leaking, spilling, losing, what have you. The economy overall is continuing to shed jobs. Now, I'm all for losing public sector jobs because those are a huge drain on the private sector. But the headline says at Politico: "Job Growth Remains Weak." There isn't any job growth. There are job losses in the public sector, mild job gains in the private sector.

And I don't think we can even trust these numbers because June is being revised downward. So what is this 131,000 going to be in August? What are they going to tell us the 131,000 really is in 30 days? 150,000? 175,000? Can we go ahead and guess? The experts never know. The experts are constantly and always shocked and surprised by this. If it were me, I would be saying the economy is headed in the wrong direction. Maybe I just don't get it. Maybe I don't. Now, as we get closer to these January tax increases, who in the world thinks that private sector job growth is going to accelerate? We're not in a recovery. There's no recovery whatsoever. We are on life support, and Pelosi is bringing back the House to spend billions of dollars we don't have on states who cannot afford their public sector workers.

The patient is dying. The patient is not recovering. And all we get out of this is Christina Romer quitting. Christina Romer, the Council of Economic Advisers, is splitting the scene. Supposedly she doesn't get along with Larry Summers. That is the rumor out there. That's the rumor out there. Of course, why not? Larry Summers, according to women in Harvard, hates women. Christina Romer is going back to her gig teaching economics at Berkeley, UC-California Berkeley. What people have forgotten about Christina Romer is that she has written in the past of the magic of tax rate reductions leading to economic growth. They had to scrub that from any website that has quoted her saying that. So she is gone. Now look at the five quotes here. They are all from Reuters.

"'The perception that there is job growth and an economic recovery is underway appears to be a myth,' said Todd M. Schoenberger, managing director, LandColt Trading." Number 2: "'The foundation for employment growth occurs in promising consumer sentiment and confidence readings -- both of which continue to be frighteningly low,' Schoenberger said." Number 3: "Today's number does not initiate a Fed policy move, but the overall trend does," Schoenberger said, and then gave us number 4: "Investors should be on high alert when Bernanke & Co. get together on Tuesday.'" Number 5: "Art Cashin, director of floor operations at UBS Financial Services, said on CNBC he think July's employment figures could dim prospects for the stock market. 'We may be getting ready to put a top on this summer rally here.'"

That is a Reuters story. "Futures Fall Sharply After Jobs Report," and the Dow Jones Industrial Average is now 136 right now, 136-1/2. "'The perception that there is job growth and an economic recovery is underway appears to be a myth,' said Todd M. Schoenberger, managing director, LandColt Trading." Reuters went out and found this guy. Here is more. "To jolt economy..." In fact, I want to go back to the past. What we have done here is gone back and gotten news stories from the past that highlight Obama's promises and Bite Me's promises for stimulating the economic recovery. This is a story from U.S. News and World Reports that ran December 9, 2008: "To Jolt Economy, Obama and Congress Eye Billions in Infrastructure Spending."

Number 2: "Stimulus Jolt: Obama Promises 600,000 Jobs in 100 Days," from the LA Times, June 8, 2009, a little over a year ago. Number 3: "Experts: Economic Stimulus Plan Would be a Short-term Shot in the Arm." February 11, 2008. Sarah Lockyer, Nation's Restaurant News. Number 4: "Politics Today: A New Stimulus Jolt," September 30, 2009. That is CBS News. That is all stuff in the past. Obama's stimulus and all of the infrastructure spending was going to "jolt" the economy and he promised 600,000 jobs in a hundred days. And Biden is out there saying, "We're going to be," by this time, "producing 500,000 jobs a month." Now we're in the "Summer of Recovery," halfway through, and not recovering. We're on life support.

We go back and look at what all of these people said. Biden, Obama, and others in the media were promising all this great stuff as a result of the stimulus spending. Let's move to the present. Stephen Dinan, Washington Times: "Social Security in the Red -- Social Security will pay out more this year than it gets in payroll taxes, marking the first time since the program will be in the red since it was overhauled in 1983, according to the annual authoritative report released Thursday by the program's actuary." I don't care where you look, and I'm in the trying to be a downer here, but we have to call these people out when they make things up about an economic recovery and how things are going. "How bad would it be if we hadn't done what we had done?" Now Obama is out using Bush's name. Using his name, not just talking about his "predecessor." He's actually criticizing Bush by name on a number of things.

So I hate to sit here and tell you the truth about things, but you have to know it (I'm sure most of you do) and it isn't being reported. Now, Obama went to all these auto factories. He went to Ford, General Motors. I wonder if he will be talking to the employees at these places? "Postal Service Loses $3.5 Billion, Concerned with Future Liquidity." Will Obama show up and give them a pep talk?

RUSH: Here is Obama this afternoon at Gelberg Signs speaking about this in Washington, speaking about the economy. This is the leader of the regime lying, just plain lying.

OBAMA: (godlike echo) The road to recovery doesn't follow a straight line. The Department of Labor released its monthly jobs report showing that July marked the seventh straight month of job creation in the private sector. We've now added private sector jobs every month this year, instead of losing them as we did for the first seven months of last year -- and that's a good sign.

RUSH: That was a tepid bunch of applause. We lost 131,000 jobs in July and in June the figures were revised downward to over 200,000 jobs lost and the man actually said, "The Department of Labor released its monthly jobs report showing that July marked the seventh straight month of job creation in the private sector." We're at 131,000 jobs down, unemployment is at 9.5%, and we're creating jobs? We have a recovery going on? We don't. We are on life support. Here's more Obama...

OBAMA: Our manufacturing sector, that has been hit hard for as long as folks can remember, has actually added 183,000 jobs this year.

OBAMA: That's the most robust seven months of manufacturing growth in over a decade.

OBAMA: Just this morning there was a report about the growing trends of manufacturing plants returning to the United States from overseas instead of the other way around.

OBAMA: All three U.S. auto makers are now posting a profit for first time since 2004, and since they emerged from bankruptcy, the auto industry as a whole has added 76,000 jobs. So there's some good trends out there.

RUSH: This is all made up. That is all made up. This "road to recovery" is a U-turn. There is no recovery. I mean, this is just blatant lying -- and you wait until health care kicks in. When taxes actually go up, when energy actually becomes more expensive and less available -- when the real effects of the monstrosity that is the Obama regime and this Congress take effect -- the name Barack Obama will be worse than the name of Herbert Hoover. We had Hoovervilles then; we have Obamavilles today. He says jobs have been created every month this year. We should all be celebrating, right? Trillions of dollars in deficit spending and Obama believes 9.5% percent unemployment is a great success? Okay, Democrats, go run on that. Obama is telling you how to campaign. You go out there and run on, "Why, we're on a road to recovery!" All these brand new private sector jobs, it's worth throwing a party. We should all be celebrating. I'm sure the media can find all the celebrations. I'm sure the media will be able to find all the pockets in the country where people are really feeling good about the country all of a sudden and will be able to do news stories on that, right? And the Democrats can run on all of this new hiring and all the excitement, all of the good vibes of the economic recovery. He is out there praising himself for 9.5% unemployment, praising himself for foreclosures and bankruptcies. So here is the deal: If you like where the economy is and you want more of it, then it's very simple. Vote Democrat.

RUSH: Can you imagine the party we're going to have when unemployment gets up to 10% from the current 9.5%?Can you imagine how it's going to look watching him pat himself on the back for that achievement? Whoa! Can't wait! Happy days are here again thanks to the regime!

RUSH: Cincinnati. We start with David. Great to have you on the EIB network. How.

CALLER: I want to discuss the declining wages of people who are actually getting jobs.

CALLER: I work at an aviation repair facility and we picked up a few of the laid over workers from DHL in Wilmington.

CALLER: They were rattling over some of the wages they were making. Some of them were making north of $34 an hour and I don't think we are paying them at our place. What I'm seeing here is with declining wages you have a declining tax base. So you have a declining tax base with government spending growing. It's a mathematical impossibility to solve. You go anywhere... I was going to the grocery and I had a 55-year-old man bagging my groceries. I mean, there are no good jobs to go back to. We have no manufacturing.

RUSH: In fact, the regime has put out stories saying that many of these jobs that we lost are not going to be replaced.

CALLER: Well, I'm going to tell you something that happened to my dad. In 1980 or '79, he got laid off from Ford Motor Company but when things did turn around -- thank God for Reagan -- he got called back.

CALLER: These guys who are getting laid off from General Motors, they're tearing the building down. They are not going back to good jobs.

RUSH: No, and you know what? General Motors CEO, by the way, Mr. Whitacre, is out there saying, "You know what? We don't like being Government Motors. We don't like people talking about being owned by the government. We're going to go out and we're going to have an IPO. We are going to have an Initial Public Offering! We're going to go back and go public. We're going to sell stock. We're going to have investors." Now, how many people are going to want to pony up and invest in General Motors given what happened to General Motors and Chrysler the last time? Who is going to want to invest in had a company that is being run by the union? The union is the vast... I think in the case of Chrysler (one of the two, Chrysler or General Motors) the union is the majority owner.

CALLER: Hey, Rush. Hey teacher. Hey, rabbi of the conservative temple. Here is what I have to say to you. Here is the flaw in President Obama's auto logic. What person in their right mind is going to go out right now and take out a car loan for $50,000 or more on a vehicle that will be worth less than half when it's paid for? It's not going to happen.

RUSH: What, are we talking about? Are you talking about the Volt by any chance here?

CALLER: No, sir. I'm talking about any car note. I have been through this. We're getting through it. Let me tell you, Rush: I will never have another car note again. If I can't afford to pay for it up front, I won't buy it. I suspect there are a lot of Americans out there who think just like I do -- and here we are, God help us, throwing stimulus money after an industry that is predicated upon people going to a bank and borrowing money they don't have in the first place! Mark my words: The auto successes that he claims are going to be short-lived.

RUSH: Well, you know, General Motors just did buy a lending company in the private sector. Which means the government now owns a lending company. Now, what story are you bouncing off of? You said Obama talked about car sales? What did I miss here?

CALLER: From what I understand from what you said and what I hear, he talks about how the stimulus is a success and that is just not true. It's a fallacy. It is based upon him taking money that we don't have in the first place and giving it to the automakers. Look at what General Motors did. He came out a few months ago, Whitacre did, and said, "We're a success. We're paying these loans off." No, they didn't. They robbed Peter to pay Paul. That's what I'm talking about.

RUSH: Oh, okay. Well, yeah. All right. I thought there was something new that Obama said about cars. Yeah, there's no question you're right.

RUSH: John in Medford, Oregon, welcome to the EIB Network and Open Line Friday. Hi.

CALLER: Hi, Rush, an honor to speak with you this afternoon. I just want to encourage Obama to continue spouting these speeches about the economy recovery, because I feel like those of us out here in the private sector, we're experiencing the exact opposite with perfect clarity. Those of us who still have jobs -- I'm one of the still fortunate to have a job -- we're extremely insecure with our situation.

RUSH: I agree. Let him go out there and keep touting his great economy. That is why I say, "When we get to 10% unemployment, let's throw a huge party." I mean, he is celebrating now at 9.5%, patting himself on the back. He's talking about all the great things happening out there. We lose 131,000 jobs in the month of July and he talks about all the jobs we're gaining? Keep it up. And run against Bush? Right on. Right on. He's beginning to believe all this pap. He's living the lie.

RUSH: Who is next? This is Phil in Las Vegas. Great to have you on the EIB Network, sir. Hello.

CALLER: Hello, Rush, been an and if of yours for 20 years. My wife turned me onto you years ago when we got started in our business here in Las Vegas and I have been listening ever since.

CALLER: Let me tell you, I have two concerns. I know you've talked about this and I'd love for you to refresh your memory. When the Republicans do kick butt this November, which I'm expecting them to do.

CALLER: Obviously, the opposition is going to say, "Okay, see, now, all the problems from then on are going to be Republican's fault." So the two things that I have really been disappointed so far with the Republicans in their ability to articulate their points of view, is I'm not seeing anything in writing like Newt Gingrich had with the Contract with America in '94. Two, how are they going to differentiate their position from Obama's and the Democrat position leading into 2012. Because without that 2012 election happening, I don't think the '10 election is going to mean as much as it could. (click)

CALLER: No, no, no. I'm sorry. What I was asking is: What is the Republican strategy after the '10 election?

CALLER: Well, (snorts), what should it be? I know you talk about this and I have heard it before. But this is the frustrating thing that I have with the current craft of some Republicans, is I'm not seeing anything in writing or really articulated well a TV or radio about what the policies should be for the Republicans when they win in 2010, and how can they apply that to win in '12. Because without a victory 2012, I don't see that 2010 is going to be enough.

RUSH: Well, the two are not connected. You can't say that whatever happens in 2010 is going have a role in whoever wins the White House in 2012. That is going to be up to whoever the Republican nominee is to win 2012. If the Republicans win the Congress or at least the House, maybe the Senate, win both, it's not up to them to define what is going to happen 2012. That is going to be the presidential nominee who ever that is, and we don't have any idea. I agree with you that the Republicans are not putting anything out there to distinguish themselves against the regime. They are simply relying on the fact that we aren't Democrats. That seems to be what they are relying on. I don't know how to say this any differently: I think the Republicans (there are exceptions but the vast majority) live in Washington and want to be part of the Washington culture.

They don't want to be dismissed, criticized, disrespected or any of that. So they are not going to make a whole lot of waves. I don't see an ideological movement right now coming out of the Republican Party. The ideological movement is in the tea party and that is happening at the grassroots area. Now, whether the Republicans need something in writing, that really doesn't happen until you get a presidential nominee. But going into any presidential year, 2004, 2008, and the Democrats didn't have anybody speaking for them until after they had a presidential nominee. They had the media speaking for them, the media was carrying their water, but they didn't have a single identified leader. I understand your frustration that the Republicans are not taking the opportunity here to contrast themselves and it's the greatest opportunity they will have ever have to contrast who they are with what Obama is.

I just think there is some lingering fear elected Republican politics levels to be critical of Obama because of what the media is going to say about them and fear that they are going to be called racist or worse or what have you. But I'll tell you one thing. Where we are right now, Phil, just speaking between you and me (you know, don't repeat this, don't tell anybody), but if all the Republicans did after November is stand up and say, "Stop," I'd be happy. If all they would do is stand up and say, "Stop, Mr. President! No more," that would be a great beginning, as far as I'm concerned. Right now I'm not going to obsess about whether they are going to come up with an agenda, because they are never going to get an agenda passed, Phil, as long as he is president.

They are never going to be able to override his veto. What the Republicans are going to have to be instructed to do, what they are going to have to do, is come up with a stiff spine because after saying, "No," everybody is going to dump on them. Obama can't wait for a Republican-led Congress. It's easier to blame the Republicans for things going wrong than it is to blame your own party. Right now, it's inescapable. The Democrats are in charge of everything going on here. That's why they are running against Bush. So Obama is looking forward to having Republicans in Congress so he can say, "See? I wanted these great ideas to create jobs and reduce the deficit, but the Republicans are standing in the way and saying no," and that is when the Republicans are going to have to have the guts to say, "Damn right we are saying no! We are saying 'no' to the last two years. We are saying 'no' to any more of this." If they would just do that, Phil, I think we would all be happy. If we could just get unified on the Republican Party standing up and saying, "No! No more! Stop," that would be huge progress.

RUSH: I know it's easier said than done. The Republicans are going to have to run as the "Party of 'No,'" and they are going to have to vote like the "Party of 'Hell No!'" I know what you are thinking. "Rush, if they do that, Democrats are just going to call them the 'Party of "No"' and we're not going to get anywhere." At some point, we have to start saying no. At some point we have to say, "Stop!" Isn't that what we are all doing? "Stop it! Just stop! We want to turn back the hands of time now." People are saying, "We're going to need more than just no, Rush. We're going to have to have an agenda." What's hard about an agenda given what we are seeing here? All you have to do is talk positively about the future of the country. Economics, we know what works: Tax cuts, cut the corporate tax rate, cut the personal income tax rate.

Do not have the health care plan tax increases go into play. Make the Bush tax cuts continue. Put money in the hands of the American people; stop putting it in the hand of government. It's easy, very simple. Well, it's simple for you and me. (interruption) Well, defund some of the programs. That's not going to go anywhere. They are not going to defund anything. Maybe health care would be the way of going about that instead of repealing it off the bat. But it's not going to be hard to show a contrast with socialism. What...? How much work does that take? How much thinking or strategy does that require? "We're not socialists. We're capitalists. We're going to rebuild the job creation sector of America. We're going to put you back to work. We're doing to get all the obstacles in your way out of your way, including President Obama."

RUSH: Another thing. The Republicans have to think about something. It's three months before the election and there's a cardinal rule. That is when the opponent is committing suicide and making an idiot of himself, just get out of the way and let him happen -- and the Democrats are doing that. There is no reason the Republicans need to make themselves a target right now. That is going to happen soon enough. Let the action continue to focus on what the Democrats are doing, not what the Republicans may or may not say.

RUSH: I want to say something. I know this is not going to go down well among those who have knee-jerk reactions and I know this is not going to go down well among people who have this notion that fairness is the overriding objective of any society. I've made the point throughout my career, the undeniable truths of life, many monologues on this program, that life is not fair by definition. Life isn't fair. I mean, it just isn't, and there's no way that you can change certain aspects that make life unfair to make them fair. Life is not equal. Sometimes people earn more than others. Some people have children when other people can't. There's nothing unfair about that. That's just the way it is. Unspeakable tragedies happen to some families; they don't happen to others. Some people live a long time; some people don't. There's no explaining any of this. Nobody's in charge of this. There's no government that can change this, although we have plenty of busybodies trying to on this "living longer" business. (imitating busybody) "Oh yeah, some people are living longer because they don't smoke, drink, eat trans fats," and go down that ridiculous road. But the vast majority of things that occur in the process of living life are unequal and unfair.

You have people who are career criminals who are wealthy and never get caught. They're pursued; never get caught. They enjoy the fruits of their ill-gotten gain. There are people who play by the rules each and every day who don't make much money. It's not because the Constitution's not fair, it's not because America's unfair, it's not because America as constituted is not right or unjust or immoral. There are some people who go to church every day, have some of the most unfortunate, unspeakably rotten things happen to them, true believers. Other people, agnostics and atheists who seem to be living fun, enjoyable, carefree lives, you look at it and say that's just not fair, not right. Well, maybe it isn't. Certainly unfair, certainly unequal but it's not because America's not unfair. It's not because America's Constitution is unjust. There are people who work in sewers. There are people who work in trash and sludge all day long who don't make much money. There are people who have never gotten their fingernails dirty, who are multibillionaires. Not fair. Not equal.

There are people who you look at who do work that is far more important morally, economically than other people and the work they do and yet those people who don't make much money, teachers, a lot of people think teachers are the most important people we have in society and look at what they make compared to athletes. Athletes are another thing. Champions are born. They are not made in the weight room. They are not made on the practice field. It's honed and it's practiced and it's improved, but champions are born. If you can't run a 4.2 40, nobody can teach you how. If you can't throw a baseball 100 miles an hour, nobody can teach you how. It's not fair. Some people can and some can't. It's not because the Constitution or the country's unfair. It's not because America's unjust, that some people can end up playing Major League Baseball and others can't. And it's certainly not fair that among those who play Major League Baseball, some of the most immoral rotten schlubs, constant drunks, drug abusers, are the biggest stars, biggest heroes and some of the ones that are clean and pure as the wind-driven snow, God, country, church every day, get cut, don't make teams. Not fair. Certainly not equal. Not because the Constitution's unfair. It's not because America as constituted is unfair.

There are some people in the world who are born in some of the most God-awful places and circumstances and throughout their lives never escape those God-awful places and circumstances. And there are other people who are born in the laps of luxury, who sip cocktails at 4:30 in the afternoon, inherit their money and look down on those who earn it. It's not fair. It's not equal. But it's not because of the US Constitution. It's not because of the United States of America.

There are people who have lived upstanding lives, who are the models of decorum in their communities and for no reason whatsoever a drunk driver kills them. Gosh, that's not fair. And it certainly isn't equal, but it's not because of the US Constitution. It's not because of the United States of America. You can conjure up all these examples. They are never ending. It's a limitless list of examples that we can all cite if you want to stick in the country. Some people in this country are born to wealthy families. Some people end up marrying wealthy people. Other people end up marrying people who lose their jobs, lose their careers, and end up on skid row. Not fair. Certainly not equal, but it's not the fault of the US Constitution. There are some people who are able to watch football, basketball, baseball games from air-conditioned suites, sky boxes, what have you. Others have to sit out in the stands freezing or getting wet or what have you, pay through the nose for it to boot. Certainly not fair, certainly not equal, and certainly not the fault of the US Constitution. Not the fault of the United States of America.

None of these inequities, none of this unfairness means that the Constitution has been violated. None of these inequities or inequalities or unfairness means that the United States of America is unjust and immoral. None of it means that the way we've governed ourselves is unfair. It doesn't mean that somebody owes you something. It doesn't mean that you're a victim of anything. It's just called life. And I realize a number of you out there on the left are probably just screeching about now claiming I'm insensitive and lacking in compassion and don't get it when it's just the other way around. It's life. You live your life. We all make decisions: good, bad, indifferent. Some of us are leaders. Some of us are followers. Some of us have unique talents. Some of us don't have any. Some of us have great confidence. Some of us are forever burdened with inferiority complex. Some of us care only what we're thought of; others couldn't care less.

It doesn't mean that anybody's better than anybody else or anybody's any worse. It certainly doesn't mean the United States of America sucks and it doesn't mean that our Constitution needs to be blown up and rewritten, and it doesn't mean you're a victim. It's called life. Everybody tries to live their life. Some people get a better handle on it than others. Some people think they have no control over their lives. They are constant victims that are always looking to blame everybody else for what doesn't go right in their lives. Other people don't have time for that. They realize they only have one life and every day is something to seize, to make the most of. Regardless where you fall in this spectrum, it doesn't mean we have a flawed country, and it doesn't mean our Constitution is flawed. It doesn't mean you're a victim. It means you're alive.

In this country, in the United States of America right now, today, August the 5th, 2010, regardless of your race, regardless of your sex, your gender, or your orientation, you have more liberty and more opportunity to change anything about your life that you don't like than anywhere else in the world, because you live in the United States of America, because you are an American. It is time to stop thinking of yourself as a victim of America, of unfairness, of inequality, and realize the good fortune you have had to be born in this country because regardless of where you grew up, regardless of where you live, regardless of where you're born, regardless of whether you're gay, straight or like goats, you have more liberty and more opportunity. Whether you haven't married a rich woman who inherited her money from a guy who inherited his money who died in a helicopter, it doesn't matter. Wherever you are and whoever you are and whatever you are, you have more opportunity to change what you don't like about yourself than anybody else in the rest of the world because you live in the United States of America.

Your lot in life is not because you live in America. You are not a victim if you're an American. You are among a precious few worldwide, and the people who are not Americans wish to hell they were and will do anything to become Americans. And yet we have a seemingly growing portion of our population who look at being an American as some kind of a limitation, a shackle. You're not a victim. Life isn't fair. Life isn't equal. Nobody can make it fair and nobody can make it equal, and all these things that make you unhappy are not because of the US Constitution. It does not have to be destroyed. It does not have to be blown up. In fact, I would venture to say that most of the unhappiness in the country today is being borne by people who love this country and who are watching it right before their very eyes be destroyed and wish to save it, and they are being told they're the reasons that life is unfair and unequal, because they are supposedly the majority.

CALLER: I've been listening to you for many, many years. I really enjoyed your presentation on how we should be thankful and how we measure what is happiness. I believe that happiness is not material things. It's a peace of mind that you have, and knowing that because we live in this wonderful country, we can change things. We are having a local election along with the national election and we have some fantastic young candidates who have the same values that I have, and I'm doing everything I can to support them to change things, and we are so blessed to live here.

CALLER: And I see people that are happy. When we first started out in our marriage, we had limited income. We were happy then. Now we have more income and we're still blessed. But it's not the material things that are making me happy.

RUSH: Well, happiness is a definition. I mean, there is a definition for it but I think it differs from person to person. Watching the assault on this country -- watching the assault on the Constitution, the assault on our liberty and freedoms -- is the hardest thing I've ever witnessed in my lifetime without question, and that's what we're seeing. We're seeing it every day, several times a day. Regardless what other things in life make me happy, this is making me miserable, and a lot of people are in the same boat. They just think, "Is there anything we can do about this? Is it too late to change any of this?" Of course it isn't, but the odds seem so long.

Since there are some links you may want to go back to from time-to-time, I am going to begin a list of them here. This will be a list to which I will add links each week.

This appears to be a daily pork report, apparently as pork in Washington bills is discovered, it gets posted at Tom Coburg’s website:

News Organization (I mention them because I have seen 2 honest stories on their website, which shocked and surprised me):

The Magic Negro Watch (this is peppered with obscenities and angry conservative rhetoric):

Obamacare class action suit (as of today, joining in on the suit costs you whatever you want to donate, if I understand the form correctly):

Weatherman Underground 1969 “You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.”

In case you need to reference this, here are the photos of all those on the JournoList:

Janine Turner’s website (I’m serious; and the website is serious too). This is if you have an interest in real American history:

Since this will be with us for a long time, the timeline of the BP gulf oil spill:

This is cool: a continuous timeline of the spill, with the daily info and the expansion of the oil, and the response:

Do you want to watch what is happening on our border? These are actual videos of observations cams along the border:

Celebrity Jihad (no, really). The headline to one story: Heroic Helen Thomas Tells Jews to "Get the Hell Out of Palestine," Go Back to Germany, Poland. Under the heading harlots, there are bunches of photos of starlets showing cleavage or wearing bikinis. This site appears to be deeply tongue-in-cheek.

Legendary White House reporter and founding member of the Muppets Helen Thomas made a heroic stand against the Zionists late last month, telling Jews to "get the hell out of Palestine" and to go home to "Poland and Germany."

Before the Jews sink their devilish claws into Helen, we want to show our solidarity by calling on all Jews to leave Zionist Occupied Hollywood by the end of June, or we shall begin "Operation Gevalt," which will disrupt all shipments of Nova lox to the west coast.

The Freedom Project (most a conservative news and opinion site which appears to concentrate on matters financial)

Weekly poll, asking you to identify what we ought to cut in governmental spending:

Are you tired of all the unfocused news and lame talking heads yelling at one another? Just grab a cup of coffee, sit back, and see what is really going on in the world:

Judith Miller is one of the moderate and fairly level-headed voices for FoxNews:

Conservative New Media (it is so-so; I must admit to getting tired of seeing the interviewer high-fiving Carly Fiorina 3 or 4 times during an interview):

Army Ranger Michael Behenna sentenced to 25 years in prison for 25 years for shooting Al Qaeda operative

Maybe the White House does not need to hold press conferences? It releases exclusive articles daily right here:

This is quite helpful; it is a list of all leftist groups, with links to background information on each of these groups (when I checked, 879 groups were listed). This is a fantastic resource.

One of the more radical people from the right, calling for the impeachment of Obama:

The Center for Freedom and Prosperity, a free enterprise site (there are several videos on the flat tax):

This is a pretty radical site which alleges that Obama is a Marxist hell-bent in taking over our country:

1982 interview with Larry Grathwohl on Ayers' plan for American re-education camps and the need to kill millions

This is an interesting site; it seems to be devoted to the debate of climate change:

This is a news site which I just discovered; they gave 3 minute coverage to Obama’s healthcare summit and seemed to give a pretty decent overall view of it, without slanting one way or the other:

I have glanced through their website and it seems to be quite professional and reasonable. They have apparently been around since 1942.

This is fantastic; Florida (the Sunshine State) is now putting its state budget online:

Suzanne Somers s supposed to be older than Bill O’Reilly? He interviewed her this week, and she looked, well, hot. She is big into vitamins and human growth hormones.

The National Journal, which is a political journal (which, at first glance, seems to be pretty even-handed):

And I am hoping that most people see this as non-partisan: Citizens Against Government Waste:

This website reveals a lot of information about politicians and their relationship to money. You can find out, among other things, how many earmarks that Harry Reid has been responsible for in any given year; or how much an individual Congressman’s wealth has increased or decreased since taking office.

This is an outstanding website which tells the truth about Obama-care and about what the mainstream media is hiding from you:

Politico.com is a fairly neutral site (or, at the very worst, just a little left of center). They have very good informative videos at:

On Obama (if you have not visited this site, you need to check it out). He is selling a DVD on this site as well called Media Malpractice; I have not viewed it yet, except pieces which I have seen played on tv and on the internet. It looks pretty good to me.