I Want a Big Change - From These Democrat Screw Ups

Disclaimer: Personally I hate the Democratic Party for their increasingly radical anti-Constitution socialist leanings and anti-American ideology. I hate the Republican Party equally, because Barack Obama is as much their creation as the far left's - while having the "bully pulpit" they pandered too much to liberals, at times abandoned conservatism for political gain and failed to decrease the size of government when they had the chance.

However: I do my homework and we have to give credit where it's due if we are to remain intellectualy honest. Anyone who seriously is looking for positive change would *not* vote for Democrats based on their performance in Congress. Here is why:

The Obama/Biden ticket's entire campaign theme is based on "the last eight years." Maybe we should really look at "the last two years," or the time period when both the House and the Senate were run by Democrats.

In December 2006, after six years of Bush and the last month before the Democrats took over both houses of the national legislature, a snapshot of our economy looked like this.

*Unemployment stood at 4.4%.

*Real GDP growth over the previous four years (under a Republican President, House and Senate) averaged 3% per year.

*A gallon of regular gasoline cost $2.30.

*The S&P 500 stock index stood at 1418, or 84% above its post-911 low and more than 7% higher than when Bush took office.

*Every year of Bush's Presidency, real (inflation-adjusted) disposable income per person went up.

*By the end of 2006, the average person was making 9% more in real terms than before Bush became President .

If you recall, that 2006 election was considered a referendum on Iraq. The people wanted change, so they threw out the Republicans and replaced them with Democrats. Welcome Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi.

Here is how they handled Iraq once in office: Harry Reid told us that the Iraq war was "lost" and the surge was not "accomplishing anything." Senator Obama introduced legislation that would have prevented the surge and would have taken all US troops out of Iraq by March 2008 (that would be seven months ago, as you read this) .

Were they right?

Barack Obama now admits that "the surge succeeded." So much for that change. And as the surge succeeded, Congress's approval ratings plummeted. The latest CBS/New York Times poll has it at 12%, well less than half of the already low level it stood at when the Republican Congress was being tossed out in 2006.

What Congress would not investigate was anything about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. In fact, they fought against such investigations and cast aspersions against anyone who would even doubt the soundness of those institutions. Here is what Barney Frank said:

These two entities, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, are not facing any kind of financial crisis. The more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing.

You can also see on YouTube how Democrats treated the regulators trying to reign in Fannie and Freddie.

On the other hand, here is what the New York Times had to say in 2003

The Bush administration is rightly pushing for the Treasury Department to regulate the two giants, along with the network of federal home loan banks. Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae provide financing to lenders by creating a secondary market for mortgages. All told, these two institutions' debt portfolio exceeds more than $1.5 trillion. Their current regulator is ill equipped to keep tabs on Freddie's and Fannie's sophisticated hedging strategies and the other financial moves they use to manage their huge investments.

And here is what John McCain said on the Senate floor:

For years I have been concerned about the regulatory structure that governs Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac... I join as a cosponsor of the Federal Housing Enterprise Regulatory Reform Act of 2005, S. 190, to underscore my support for quick passage of GSE regulatory reform legislation. If Congress does not act, American taxpayers will continue to be exposed to the enormous risk that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac pose to the housing market, the overall financial system, and the economy as a whole.

On the other hand, who supported the surge? George W. Bush and John McCain.

Who tried to strengthen the oversight and regulation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac? George W. Bush and John McCain.

In the case of the surge, Bush and McCain got their way. The result? Apparent victory in Iraq, a country that is now a democracy, at peace with its neighbors, no longer a WMD threat, no longer a terrorist sanctuary, and no longer filling hundreds of mass graves with hundreds of thousands of its own citizens.

In the case of Fannie and Freddie, Bush and McCain did not get their way - Barney Frank did. The result? The failure of Fannie and Freddie, law suits against their executives and the spark that sent banks failing and stocks falling across the globe to the point of threatening a Great Depression. -- American Thinker Randall Hoven

"Let's vote for change. Let's undo what we did in 2006."
---------------------------------------

Hat tip to Dr. Sanity who said:

"Just yesterday I was watching Huckabee on Fox when he interviewed Joe the Plumber. After the interview, they took questions from the audience and one questioner stuck in my mind. She identified herself as a Canadian and asked a question that I think captures the essene of the issue:

Why, she asked (and I paraphrase), are Americans so down on President Bush? Since 9/11 he has managed to keep your country from being attacked again and taken the battle to the enemy...he was right about the surge and now your troops are coming home victorious after freeing the Iraqi people from oppression? And, during all those years when the Iraq war was not going well, he and the Republicans persevered under difficult circumstances AND kept the economy of your country doing well.

And now, (she went on) you seem to be ignoring the fact that the Democrats have controlled Congress for the last two years and since they took over, the economy has totally tanked. Why are you blaming Bush for that?

Excellent question.

And, an even more pertinent question is why John McCain is getting blamed for it by the Democrats? Isn't that a classic case of 'guilt by association' according to the Obamacrats own standards?" -- Dr. Sanity

"So on the big things, the surge in Iraq and the failure of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that led to our recent financial mess, the Democrats were wrong. Dead wrong. One hundred eighty degrees out wrong." - Randall Hoven

While the Republicans were in power, the economy prospered.
The surge worked. Thanks to a Republican President
We have been safe since 9/11 - the terrorist war is on M.E. soil where it belongs. Thanks to a Republican President
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have created devastation - thanks to the Democratic social engineering via the likes of Barney Frank and Nancy Pelosi.
And now the Dems want to make things worse by "spreading the wealth around" and pushing us over the brink into socialism. And they are not above using deplorable tactics like demonizing nice, ordinary people to get there.

Democrats? Again? No. Thanks.

Really I'm almost hoping Obama wins - if having a marxist in office would cause the right to become energized enough to return to our Constitutional roots and ideology, and support *effective* and *articulate* candidates in the future.

As always when it comes right down to it I'm

Trusting in Him,
imtheonlycathy!

We are (or were) a Constitutional Republic, not a Democracy

It seems some people think the United States is a democracy, that the original Constitution is either a "living document" to be changed at will or no big deal in the day to day workings of government. Some seem to think that the expansion of powers given to the Federal government beyond what was allowed in the original Constitution is a good thing.


The United States is one of the oldest Constitutional Republics in existence.

A constitutional republic is a state where the head of state and other officials are elected as representatives of the people, and must govern according to existing constitutional law that limits the government's power over citizens. In a constitutional republic, executive, legislative, and judicial powers are separated into distinct branches and the will of the majority of the population is tempered by protections for individual rights so that no individual or group has absolute power. The fact that a constitution exists that limits the government's power makes the state constitutional. That the head(s) of state and other officials are chosen by election, rather than inheriting their positions, and that their decisions are subject to judicial review makes a state republican.

Constitutional Republics are a deliberate attempt to diminish the threat of mobocracy thereby protecting dissenting individuals and minority groups from the tyranny of the majority by placing theoretical checks on the power of the majority of the population. The power of the majority of the people is checked by limiting that power to electing representatives who, theoretically, are required to govern within limits of overarching constitutional law rather than the popular vote having legislative power itself (even though such representatives are elected by said majority, creating a definitive conflicted interest). The United States of America is one of the oldest constitutional republics in the world.

John Adams defined a constitutional republic as "a government of laws, and not of men." Also, the power of government officials is checked by allowing no single individual to hold executive, legislative and judicial powers. Instead these powers are separated into distinct branches that serve as a check and balance on each other. A constitutional republic is designed so that "no person or group [can] rise to absolute power."

Alexander Tsesis, in The Thirteenth Amendment and American Freedom: A Legal History says, to him, a constitutional republic means "a representative polity established on fundamental law, each person has the right to pursue and fulfill his or her unobtrusive vision of the good life. In such a society, the common good is the cumulative product of free and equal individuals who pursue meaningful aims."

We're not a democracy, we're not a mobocracy, and the Constitution has been thrashed to within an inch of its life while "we the people" have looked the other way and allowed special interests and social engineers to dominate. What has kept us alive in the past is this: Our representatives are sworn to represent the people by upholding the Constitution. When they fail, our country is weakened. The actions of Congress last week took a giant step away from our origins as a Constitutional Republic, and toward a malignant socialism via nationalization of vast corporate assets, a move which is well beyond the bounds of the Constitution.

In other words, the interests of a few have been allowed to dominate the interests of the people via unfettered and anti-Constitutional legislation. It appears none of our representatives care about the ideological principles the nation was founded on, but instead vie with each other to find loopholes through which to shove their favorite pet pork projects.

Disgusting.

===========================
Now on to the discussion

This comment set me off on an even longer rant:

Documents such as the constitution are, in practice, nothing more than pieces of paper

Sigh.

Okay. Here we go, hang on a sec. My response:

How sad to think the Constitution is viewed as nothing more than a piece of paper.

You can toss the Declaration of Independence into that same trash bin I suppose.

But for those who pledged "their lives, their fortunes, their sacred honor" this new form of government "of the people, by the people, and for the people" was everything they were willing to literally die for.

So to translate for the uninformed: It is an ideology, a worldview, a point of view, upon which this country was founded. Of course that means little to some I suppose.

and I suppose the flag is just bits of cloth sewn together.


Ignorance and greed have sold what they fought for rather cheaply, imho. In the end our government will never work again, unless people are (1) willing to dismantle the constitution completely and admit they want and will vote for a new democratic socialist state or (2) go back to where we came from with a simplified and strictly constitutional government, handing power back to the states, though I doubt this could ever happen.

Why? Without the conventional checks and balances in place, we are uniquely vulnerable now, more than ever before in the nation's history. The power of special interests have nearly broken the back of the Constitutional Republic and replaced it with a counterfeit that clearly isn't working for the people. Intelligent people understand that government-subsidized anything equals eventual graft and corruption.


We are in the middle of a crisis, and it isn't the economy that's in danger it's the people's trust and confidence in their government.


Our federal government was not meant to be a money-gathering apparatus, which would be in strict opposition to its original purpose. This is precisely why our original Constitution was simply constructed -- to keep the federal government lean and mean and thus keep greed's fingers out of "we the people's" money, (and therefore limiting the federal government's power as well) while focusing on a very few central tasks and a core ideology stressing individual liberty.


Welfare translates into welfare fraud.
SSDI translates into disability fraud.
Subsidized housing turns into subsidized landlords.
Nationalization of assets is practically the definition of fraud.
etc.


Funny. The more I read by the founders the more I realize many of them, having experienced tyranny in their own lifetimes and having been ardent students of the history of politics and government, never really expected it to last *this* long without perhaps another revolution or two along the way.

Thus the emphasis over and over on individual responsibility and individual liberty. Witness the 1st and 2nd Amendments. With the first we are given the message - Always retain the freedom to shoot off your mouth. With the second: and if that doesn't work be prepared to shoot off your weapons.



What we were given with the Constitution was an opportunity to retain freedoms fought for and won by others, and then to live in a peaceful and orderly society where the *united* states would provide national security, leaving the day to day operations of government to local purview within each state. Those days are long gone having been replaced by an intrusive, dictatorial, confiscatory body having no resemblance to its ancestor. Centralized government means loss of opportunity for local oversight, and increased opportunity for graft and corruption.


What a lot of people don't realize as well is this: once that door of subsidy (in the name of helping the poor) is opened, there are those who will make it their business to purposefully and deliberately target and overwhelm that program beyond its breaking point, on purpose, in order to eventually destroy the infrastructure. It's so easy, it's been done to almost every public institution. Welfare. Education. Housing. Mortgage lending. Investment banking. Even our national security at the borders has been compromised in the interests of supposedly helping the poor.

Helping the poor (disenfranchised, disabled) became the magic door-opener through which organized corruption might enter, enabled and supported by guilt-inducing propagandists and lying idealists who expressed not much more than a lack of trust in the public's motives to help privately, and by which those professing to champion those interests moved into positions of power through emotional, political and litigious blackmail. The public can't be trusted. Therefore their income must be confiscated, and redistributed as the kindly, overseeing "government" sees fit.

To disagree even softly equals hate-speech or bigotry. The gun to the head is wielded by "community activists" chanting slogans, backed by powerful coalitions, supported by useful idiots in the media and on campus, and many are in reality themselves only pawns in a more lucrative game of power mongering.


Is all of this a major shift, from the central core ideology of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution? Oh how I wish they knew....


The death knell came through the Progressives on Feb. 3, 1913 when the 16th Amendment was passed. Really it was all downhill from there. October 3rd was merely a giant leap in the same direction.

------------------/rant

and I could have gone on, but I won't. if you care, do your own research into the downfall of the Republic, 'kay?