The American Spectator

TOUCHDOWN
Re: Quin Hillyer’s The Final Completion:

Commenter “Appleby’s” suggestion that Jack Kemp was more liberal than John McCain is ridiculous. No modern day political leader was more committed to allowing the average American to decide how his hard earned wages were to be spent than Jack Kemp. The Jack I knew never saw a tax he liked. I don’t recall him advocating an increase in gas taxes. We had Reagan’s tax cuts because of Congressman Kemp. 

Yes, he was for giving currently occupied-and-paid-for government housing units to those who lived there. That is a far cry from saddling the mortgage market with paper people couldn’t pay for and that later destroyed our credit markets. Rather, it was giving people already helped by government an ownership share in “government property.” It was Thatcher like; not McCain like. 

Kemp was a great conservative. He helped Young America’s Foundation and Young Americans for Freedom every time he was ever asked. He defended Goldwater, Reagan, Gingrich and other conservatives especially in front of blue collar workers. I am from Buffalo, interned for Jack, and admired his career from his quarterbacking days. To call him a liberal is absurd.
— Ron Robinson
President, Young America’s Foundation

A wise man I can not give credit to once said, “the problem with conservatives is that they let ‘facts’ do the talking for them.” When we were making headway against a growing wave of Marxism, we had a bullhorn — Reagan. George W. Bush might have actually governed more conservatively than Reagan but who would know in a world of 300,000,000 truths?  With 80% of the media voting Democrat and most Democrats never hearing or seeing anything put forth by Republicans not skewed by an overwhelmingly Democrat media the idea that the “facts” alone are going to make any long term difference is almost silly. The School of Hard Knocks is probably going to make the decisive difference when it arrives in the near future.  

I suspect Kemp would understand all too well that to win anything in life you must penetrate your opponents’ side of the field to score points. The Republican Party has been leaderless and on the defensive since Reagan left office and far too many so called Republicans see doing Democrat Marxism one better as the way back into power. As a way back to power that might be true in the short run but real world problems require real world solutions and Democrat solutions don’t solve anything beyond lining their pockets with gold and silver and subsidizing the very problems that get them the vote. Leaderless movements eventually die. So do nations. 

Add to this an unaccountable public school system that produces future Democrats at $100,000 per copy, all paid for by tax payers who have no say or interest in fixing what is wrong with the public school system, and you have a ready made supply of unproductive, unmotivated and truly ignorant Cyborgs. The real JFK spoke once upon the dangers of an ignorant electorate. His surviving brother is living proof of this. 

The founders of this republic were a pretty diverse group of people but were able to come together on a very limited set of principles of governance paid for in blood, sweat and tears. John Adams’s belief that our form of government was only fit for a “moral people” is universally true. Only a moral people value the self worth and responsibilities necessary to support the republic. Every time we excuse murder for the sake of convenience, lying to win favor or stealing from one’s person’s labor to buy the vote of another in order serve a political end (or the end justifies the means) we brand ourselves as something far less than a moral people.  

So here we are in 2009 wishing for the good old days back in 1980 with half the able-bodied population paying little income taxes, run away government spending and we don’t seem to understand why we can’t put forth a better candidate than John McCain? If Christ himself ran for the Republican presidential ticket so called Democrat Christians (and many Republicans too) would brand him all sorts of the ugly names because his words wouldn’t reflect their blending of Marxism grafted onto the teachings of their version of Christ. The list of Democrats lining up to be Judas would be endless… 

The central ingredient in the bulk of our real problems starts and ends with personal responsibility and accountability. No one wants to deal with that in the public arena, not even the Church of Jesus Christ it seems. Jack Kemp is just one of many fallen foot soldiers in a crusade for founding principles that is starting to look like the annual salmon swim up river to produce an ever smaller next generation of salmon.
— Thom Bateman
Newport News, Virginia

50% TREACHEROUS
Re: W. James Antle, III’s Irreconcilable Differences:

Reading that legislation that could have been stopped, but was not because not one man or woman in Congress offered the moral courage to do so, really set my morning on edge. We live in days that are devolving into an autonomy where we soon will be told what to do, where to work, how much we can spend, etc, etc. We are on the downhill slope of losing personal choices of very great magnitude. 

That alone would have me stunned but I also deal with a son’s soon departure to war for his tenth tour over. And what he faces is daunting even for him to face, much less his mother and his wife. He speaks of a world quickly coming undone. And I believe he is right because we see whole countries ready to fall, either to terrorists gaining territory (Pakistan), or the country to the south of us, Mexico, that is on economic watch list because of flu and financial failures. We face multiple enemies who all desire our demise as a country and as a people and we have, at our helm, the most inexperienced President perhaps in all history. Couple that with his nefarious background and teachings he was exposed to for many years, and you find our nation at the pinnacle of looking at “the perfect storm”.

As I lift my son in prayers, and others who fight with him, I am mindful to ask God’s protection over us collectively. We always knew God was in control but no time more than now.
— Beverly Gunn
Texas

Kent Conrad was on CSPAN last week discussing the budget. He chided Republicans for daring to say anything about the irresponsibility of the federal budget his committee was putting together. Conrad sanctimoniously spewed forth that old tired line “well YOU guys spent and spent and spent when YOU were in power. So don’t say ANYTHING about us.”