I am Officially on Wordpress Now!

A few days ago I announced that I would be switching over to wordpress.com. I have decided to start posting there from now on and figure out the fancy stuff later. Check out my new posts on Michigan Redneck II at http://michiganredneck.wordpress.com/. I may come back here every once in a while to post and then cross post at Michigan Redneck II.
I want to say it was fun posting on Blogger and I hope my readers will follow me over to wordpress.

Black Leader: Democratic Party Architect of Racism (Update)

I have alos posted this at michiganredneck.wordpress.com/

Found this interesting article, by Ronald Kessler, in newsmax.com.

• Washington Insider with Ronald Kessler

• Black Leader: Democratic Party Architect of Racism

• Monday, February 25, 2008 9:43 AM
• By: Ronald Kessler

• Frances Rice, chairman of the National Black Republican Association, describes the Democratic Party as the architect of modern day racism.
• Rice, a retired Army lieutenant colonel and lawyer, says in an interview it was Republicans who pushed through much of the ground-breaking civil rights legislation in Congress. Now, she says, Republicans stand for empowering blacks to help them out of poverty. In contrast, Rice says, the Democrats push to keep blacks dependent on government handouts and encourage them to see themselves as victims.

• In Rice’s view, “The Democrats fight every effort of Republicans to get blacks out of poverty because they know that once blacks become prosperous, the Democratic Party will lose its power base.”

• Rice co-founded the National Black Republican Association in 2005 with the mission of returning African-Americans to their Republican Party roots. Because co-founder Andre Cadogan knew Newsmax CEO and Editor in Chief Chris Ruddy, the first meeting of the organization took place at Newsmax offices in West Palm Beach, Fla. The organization has grown from five members to over a thousand members. It publishes a quarterly glossy magazine — The Black Republican — and has a Web site: www.nbra.info.

• Aligning themselves with special interests, Rice says the Democrats are “fighting school-choice opportunity scholarships that are designed to get black children out of failing schools, because the teacher’s unions wants to maintain control over buildings.”

• “Our philosophy in the Republican Party is to teach a person how to fish, so he can feed himself for a lifetime, whereas the Democratic Party’s philosophy is give a man a fish, so he can eat for a day,” Rice says.
• Rice says most blacks are not aware that from its founding in 1854 as the anti-slavery party, the Republican Party has been at the “forefront of the struggle for civil rights, which is why Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was a Republican.”
• It was Republicans, she notes, who fought to free blacks from slavery and amended the Constitution to grant blacks freedom, citizenship, and the right to vote. Republicans also pushed through much of the ground-breaking civil rights legislation in Congress from the 1860s through the 1960s, Rice says.

• “It was the Democrat public safety commissioner, Eugene ‘Bull’ Connor, in Birmingham who let loose vicious dogs and turned the fire hoses on black civil rights demonstrators,” Rice says.

I recall back in the 2004 Presidential General Election the Democrats posted an ad in a magazine that has a high black readership, using pictures from such past incidents. Funny, they were trying to get blacks to vote against Republicans, of all things, using the slogan, "Don't let them do this again." In reality, it was the "them" that were Democrats.

• Democrat Georgia Gov. Lester Maddox “brandished an ax handle to prevent blacks from patronizing his restaurant,” Rice says. “Democrat Alabama Governor George Wallace stood in front of the Alabama school house in 1963 and declared that there would be segregation forever. In 1954, it was Democrat Arkansas Governor Orville Faubus who tried to prevent the desegregation of Little Rock public schools. It was Republican President Dwight Eisenhower who sent the troops into the South to desegregate the schools and who appointed Chief Justice Earl Warren to the U.S. Supreme Court, which resulted in the 1954 Brown versus Board of Education decision.” [more here]
  

Same Regime, New Face

• Raúl Castro Named Cuba’s New President

• By JAMES C. McKINLEY Jr.
• Published: February 24, 2008
• HAVANA — Raúl Castro, who has labored in the shadow of his brother Fidel since the days of the Cuban revolution, became the new president of the Communist island on Sunday, ending his brother’s 49-year rule, as well as speculation that a younger generation would take power.

Umm, just curious, how "young" is Raúl?

• In his first words as president, Mr. Castro made it clear that any changes would be limited, promising to continue to consult his brother on every important decision. He said his brother was still alive and alert, and the time had yet to come when the leaders of the revolution in the 1950s had to pass the baton to a new generation.
• “Fidel is Fidel, you know that well,” he said to the National Assembly shortly after it voted him president. “He is irreplaceable and the people will continue his work even though he is not physically here.”

• Raúl Castro said the government needed to change to survive in the new era. He proposed putting more power in the hands of provincial governments and streamlining the bureaucracy in Havana. “Today a more compact structure is required,” he said.

A good change would be giving more power to the people.

• Carlos Lage, a 56-year-old physician close to the elder Castro who engineered the economy after Soviet aid dried up in the 1990s, remains in the same role he had before, one of five vice presidents.

How many vice presidents do they need? Sounds like too many chiefs and not enough indians.

• The ballot before the Assembly contained 31 names for the top positions in the country, among them president, minister of interior and minister of the armed forces. The delegates have no choice, since there is only one name for each position. The candidates were not immediately made public.

• Perhaps the most important challenge facing the new president is the struggling economy. During his stint as acting president since 2006, Raúl Castro raised expectations among Cubans that he might act to make it easier to earn a decent salary within the state-run system.
• He has criticized the miserly state salaries as insufficient, and encouraged more public debate about the country’s problems. He has called for more productive farms and spoken of “structural changes” that he said were needed to revitalize the economy. So far, however, he has not followed these promises with actions.

• The National Assembly was chosen last month in elections completely controlled by the Communist party, the only political organization permitted on this island of 11 million people. [more here]

Emphasis mine.

Some New Changes

I have gotten an account on wordpress. Once I have comfortably navigated around I will be switching over to that address. There is a group project in the works. It has not been official. So I won't say anything yet. It is very good news.

Young Republican from Marquette County

Found this cool article from mlive.com, about young man from the First District Republicans.

• College freshman youngest delegate at Michigan GOP Convention

• 2/22/2008, 3:47 p.m. EST The Associated Press

• LUDINGTON, Mich. (AP) — At age 19, Mitchell Foster was easily the youngest delegate at the Michigan Republican Convention.
• That didn't keep the Northern Michigan University freshman from enjoying himself at the event, held Feb. 15-16 in Lansing. He was selected to represent Marquette County based on his involvement with the county GOP and the university's Young Republicans.
• "It was a blast," Foster told the Ludington Daily News for a story published Thursday. "It is an experience I will never forget." [more here]

I think this is just neat that someone so young would want to get involved in Republican Politics.

Ralph Nader Considering Another Run for the Presidency...

...just when ya thought the POTUS race couldn't get weirder.

Emulating FDR is a Horrible Idea

Another Jonah Goldberg writing, via Glenn Beck email blast.

**SPECIAL REPORT: Emulating FDR is a horrible idea**

This is the final special report in a week-long series with author Jonah Goldberg, investigating how Liberal Fascism is trying to control your life from the cradle to the grave. Don't miss tonight on TV as Glenn spends a full hour with Jonah Goldberg at 7 and 9pm ET, only on Headline News. And look for a recap of this series, the TV segments and the special reports will all be included in Monday's newsletter.

Emulating FDR: A horrible idea
By Jonah Goldberg

"America has a dictator," Benito Mussolini proclaimed, watching FDR from abroad. He marveled at how the forces of "spiritual renewal" on display in the New Deal were destroying the outdated notion that democracy and liberalism were "immortal principles." "Roosevelt is moving, acting, giving orders independently of the decisions or wishes of the Senate or Congress. ... A sole will silences dissenting voices." That almost sounds like Harry Reid talking about Bush.

Mussolini reviewed FDR's book, Looking Forward proclaiming the author a kindred spirit. The way Roosevelt "calls his readers to battle," he wrote, "is reminiscent of the ways and means by which fascism awakened the Italian people." "Without question," he continued, the "sea change" in America "resembles that of fascism." Indeed, the comparisons were so commonplace, Mussolini's press office banned the practice. "It is not to be emphasized that Roosevelt's policy is fascist because these comments are immediately cabled to the United States and are used by his foes to attack him."

The German press adored FDR. In 1934, the Vlkischer Beobachter, the Nazi Party's official newspaper, described Roosevelt as a man of "irreproachable, extremely responsible character and immovable will" and a "warm-hearted leader of the people with a profound understanding of social needs." Hitler sent FDR a letter celebrating his "heroic efforts" and "successful battle against economic distress." Hitler informed the U.S. ambassador, William Dodd, that New Dealism was also "the quintessence of the German state philosophy."

The New Dealers were not so much mimicking the Soviet Union, Fascist Italy or Nazi Germany. They were attempting to recreate what they had built -up under Woodrow Wilson's war socialism. Today we have no historical memory of how brutal the Wilson Administration was, nor do we realize that many Progressives supported the war not so much because they championed its foreign policy aims, but because they yearned for the "social possibilities of war," in the words of John Dewey, the 20th century's premier political philosopher.

The war provided an opportunity to force Americans to, as journalist Frederick Lewis Allen put it, "lay by our good-natured individualism and march in step." Or as another progressive put it, "Laissez faire is dead. Long live social control."

It was this spirit which informed FDR's administration. By 1944 he made good on Wilson's conviction that the US constitution was outmoded and in need of replacing with a new "living constitution." FDR's proposed innovation was a new "economic bill of rights" which included:

>The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation.

>The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment.

>The right of every family to a decent home.

>The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation.

You read correctly, the right to 'recreation'.

With the intellectuals on their side, Wilson recruited journalist George Creel to become a propaganda minister as head of the newly formed Committee on Public Information (CPI).

Mr. Creel declared that it was his mission to inflame the American public into "one white-hot mass" under the banner of "100 percent Americanism." Fear was a vital tool, he argued, "an important element to be bred in the civilian population."

The CPI printed millions of posters, buttons, pamphlets, that did just that. A typical poster for Liberty Bonds cautioned, "I am Public Opinion. All men fear me!... [I]f you have the money to buy and do not buy, I will make this No Man's Land for you!"

Meanwhile, the CPI released a string of propaganda films with such titles as "The Kaiser," "The Beast of Berlin," and "The Prussian Cur." Remember when French fries became "freedom fries" in the run-up to the Iraq war? Thanks in part to the CPI, sauerkraut become "victory cabbage."

Under the Espionage Act of 1917 and the Sedition Act of 1918, Wilson's administration shut down newspapers and magazines at an astounding pace. Indeed, any criticism of the government, even in your own home, could earn you a prison sentence. One man was brought to trial for explaining in his own home why he didn't want to buy Liberty Bonds.

The Wilson administration sanctioned what could be called an American fascist, the American Protective League. The APL - a quarter million strong at its height, with offices in 600 cities - carried government-issued badges while beating up dissidents and protesters and conducting warrantless searches and interrogations. Even after the war, Wilson refused to release the last of America's political prisoners, leaving it to subsequent Republican administrations to free the anti-war Socialist Eugene V. Debs and others.

The left claims that president Bush seeks to do something like this with the war on terror. But look at the evidence. No newspapers closed down, a sum total of three detainees water-boarded, two hard core terrorists who happen to be American citizens have had their habeus corpus rights "infringed." After 9/11 President Bush asked the American people to go shopping, not to give up capitalism.

Meanwhile, on the left, self-styled progressives keep trying to recreate the New Deal and the progressive era. New York Times columnist pines for a "new progressive era." Barack Obama gushed about how he was re-dedicating his campaign at the University of Wisconsin where the Progressive movement was born. Hillary says she's not a liberal but a "modern progressive."

Now, obviously, none of the current crop of self-described progressives are eager to replay the darkest chapters of the past. But we make a mistake when we assume that we can cherry pick only the good parts of our past to re-create.
Jonah Goldberg is the author of the New York Times bestseller Liberal Fascism.

Folks, if you have been following the Glenn Beck email blasts I have been copy/pasting here, ya gotta agree this is probably the most scariest and eye opening.

What Defines Conservatism?

Here is a great article about what defines conservatism by David Limbaugh, in newsmax.com. I am going to do something a little different on this. Usually when I provide snippets from an article I put in the full paragraphs that really stand out. This time I am just going to add some paragraphs and parts of other paragraphs. And like always, link to the article. Credit where credit is due.

What Defines Conservative

Wednesday, February 20, 2008 8:43 AM By: David Limbaugh

Something is missing in all the intramural debates among different stripes of Republicans this primary season. Bigger-government Republicans don't seem fully to appreciate the extent to which the differences between conservative Republicans and liberals are about more than policy. Conservatives and liberals differ not merely over the level of taxation, protection of the unborn, immigration, the war and other issues — though the importance of these disputes cannot easily be overstated. Admittedly, conservatives view these policy differences as matters of great urgency... But at an even more fundamental level, conservatives, being sentimental saps, believe — apparently unlike Michelle Obama — that the United States is not only the greatest nation in the world but also that it owes its greatness largely to its Constitution. Even if liberals were to concede this point, they would probably have different reasons for believing it is so... They're definitely all about the Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable searches and seizures — to such an extreme that they would extend it to non-citizen enemy combatants... Conservatives, by contrast, not only champion the Bill of Rights — the complete package — but also believe Americans owe our unique liberties to the scheme of governmental power established in the body of the Constitution. We believe, as did the framers, that the structural limitations on government, like the separation of powers and federalism, are what make possible individual liberties... That's why conservatives get so exercised about appellate judges who refuse to honor the Constitution as written and insist on rewriting its provisions from the bench... ...they understand that expansive government and socialism — no matter how well meaning, in some cases — are ultimately incompatible with individual liberties. Big government Republicans, however, evidently don't have the same distrust of governmental power, believing it is an unstoppable force that can't be beaten and so must be joined and harnessed to "conservative" ends. No matter how smart these intellectuals are, they just don't get it... Conservatives realize that politics (and the preservation of our liberties) ain't beanbag. They don't invest their future in the platitudes of "hope," "bipartisanship," or "kumbaya."... Instead, conservatives believe that government is a necessary evil to establish order and promote the common defense and the like but otherwise must be restrained in order to unleash the power and freedom of the individual. Conservatives should not be underestimated as mere players in a cynical chessboard game of party politics. They believe in the power of ideas and will continue to promote their ideas irrespective of the eventual identity of the respective presidential nominees and regardless of how much they are pressured to be silent about first principles... [more here] Y'all know that I consider myself more of a Conservative than a Republican. This is why I am so passionate about certain issues. I am more of an economic Conservative than anything else. Which would explain why, even though I am pro-life, I am more concerned about immigration issues and welfare reform. While Mr. Limbaugh does talk about pro-life in his article, I left those out because as a member of the "working poor" I am more affected by illegal immigration and welfare than pro-life.