By Dr. Jack Wheeler

It’s starting to look like 1948 all over again.

Mark Twain observed that while history doesn’t repeat itself, it often rhymes. The 2012 presidential campaign is now rhyming with that of 1948 in iambic trimeter – the poetic form tragedians of Ancient Greece such as Aeschylus and Sophocles used to best express portending doom.

So let’s revisit that extraordinary yesteryear of 1948, resulting in the most famous upset in American politics – Democrat Harry Truman defeating Republican Tom Dewey – and see how we can avoid a similar outcome by using it to our advantage.

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By Jack Kelly

In most countries for most of history, people were pretty much locked into the social class into which they were born. But in America men and women of modest means could become rich — if they had an idea for making life better, and worked tirelessly to make their vision real.

Entrepreneurs such as Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs became very, very rich. The rest of us were enriched, too, by the fruits of their genius and their labor — the electric light, the automobile and the computer, and tens of thousands of other inventions and new, better ways of organizing things.

People who don’t have good ideas and who don’t want to work hard want to be rich, too. Some have found a way.

In the last two years, while middle class Americans have been struggling, the net worth of Members of Congress increased 25 percent.

“How do politicians who arrive in Washington D.C. as men and women of modest means leave as millionaires?” Sarah Palin asked. “How do they miraculously accumulate wealth at a rate faster than the rest of us?”

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By Dr. Jack Wheeler

Malabo, Equatorial Guinea. It took coming here, to the darkest pit of hellhole Africa, for it to finally dawn on me who Obama really is, to what total extent he isn’t American at all, but African.

This is my first time here, and assuredly will be the last. Yet I wrote about Equatorial Guinea back in 2006 as an example of “Why Africa Is So Stupid.” It discusses the research on global IQ explaining why sub-Saharan Africa is at the bottom of humanity’s barrel in terms of tyranny, corruption, and poverty – because the average IQ of sub-Saharan Africans is 67.

Freedom House, in its 2011 Worst of the Worst report, highlights Equatorial Guinea as “one of the world’s most repressive societies.” Its dictator, Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo, is a murderer who ran the Black Beach Prison where countless prisoners were tortured to death.

Obiang uses his country’s oil revenue as his personal piggy bank, enriching his friends and family while the average citizen of his country lives on $1 a day. But there is nothing at all exceptional about him. He is merely yet another example of what in Africa are called Big Men – narcissistic charismatic sociopaths who gain power however they can, never let go of it, look upon themselves as demi-gods for whom ordinary morality does not apply, utterly convinced they deserve to be worshipped with total obedience, and to live in complete extravagance while being completely indifferent to the poverty of others.

Remind you of anyone in America?

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By Wendy McElroy

“Your papers!” In old movies, the demand is barked at trembling travelers by a Nazi with a guttural accent. If the demand is made in the opening scene, then the audience knows immediately that they watching a totalitarian state in which travelers are in danger.

“Your papers!” now rings out at every American airport and border crossing. The accent is different but travelers need to recognize with equal immediacy that a totalitarian state is playing out in front of their eyes, and they must be careful.

A passport is where the security theater begins. Indeed, without a passport those who wish to fly or cross a border are not “allowed” to be scanned, searched, interrogated, or undergo a plethora of other indignities imposed by uniformed thugs. The hoops through which passport carriers jump are all prelude to “permitting” them to exercise a right belonging to every freeborn person: the right to travel.

Things were not always this way.

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By Thaddeus McCotter (R-MI)

We must address the clear and present threat to our economy.

Our prosperity stands on the precipice. Concerned Americans demand an explanation of how this happened and leadership that will walk us back from the cliff. But in the White House and along the campaign trail, the purported leaders fail to recognize or refuse to acknowledge the clear and present threat to our economy: the Great Deflation.

The failure to differentiate between an economic recession and this Great Deflation will cause an economically doomed generation.

But this need not happen. The strength of our economy — its capacity to generate employment, opportunity, and growth — is determined by the quality of its factories and its technology and innovation; by the depth and freedom of its marketplace; and by the ingenuity and efforts of its people. By these measures, we Americans should continue to have the strongest economy in history, and one which continues to grow.

So while our economic challenges are daunting, they can be surmounted. It is only a question of our will to take action.

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By Robert Agostinelli

The sad tale of profligate spending is clear. With an abandon and reckless disregard for common-sense economics, we have mortgaged our future. This has been the fault of both sides of the political aisle. Seemingly benign acts of largesse and the application of pork-barrel spending have numbed our national sense of responsibility and left us detached from the full implications.

This has been greatly exacerbated by the equally cowardly seduction of “entitlement.” This term embodies the height of all false utopian ideals that socialism has used to seduce its wards.

Long before our current president embarked on his course of ruin, his intellectual compatriots, Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson, charted the course of our demise. They were the forerunners who, in the name of good intentions, sowed the seeds of ruin whose harvest we are reaping.

The expectation that the government has a duty and an obligation to provide entitlements is and always has been a flawed proposition. Simply put, it is a grand illusion with a vengeful ending if not corrected.

Enter President Obama, the supreme narcissistic leader of the realm, never one to “let a crisis go to waste.” His is an artful blend of Keynesian voodoo economics, increased imposition of government control, and the largest expansion of the entitlement state in our history.

The financing of Mr. Obama’s spending and expansion of government can only be sustained by way of subterfuge.

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By Dr. Jack Wheeler

Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881), one of Victorian England’s most prominent Prime Ministers (1868/1874-1880), once commented to a friend: “There are two things that the public should never be allowed to see how they are made: sausage and the law.”

We are witnesses today of just how immortally trenchant Disraeli was back in the 19th century. For in truth, observing our politicians handling the current “debt crisis” is a far more repulsive sight than the inside of a sausage factory.

Yet if Disraeli were here now, he’d smile sardonically and remind us that (he was fluent in French) plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose – the more things change, the more they stay the same.

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By Dr. Joel Wade

We’ve been losing the fight for freedom in America for the past hundred or so years.

From Teddy Roosevelt’s progressive Republicanism, to Woodrow Wilson’s fascist visions, to FDR’s New Deal liberalism, to Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society, to Richard Nixon’s wage and price controls, Jimmy Carter’s incompetence, George Bush I’s tax increases, Bill Clinton’s expansion of regulations and taxes, George Bush II’s spending spree and Medicare expansion, and Hussein Obama’s hyper-ballooning of government power and spending, everything has been a compromise with tyranny – which means that tyranny always wins.

Of course tyranny is insidious. We’ve had a struggle against it from the inception. In 1798,our second president, John Adams enacted the Alien and Sedition Acts, allowing him to imprison anybody who spoke out against him. Abraham Lincoln had a similar policy during the Civil War. Liberty has always required, and will always require, courageous men and women to speak up for her, stand up for her, and fearlessly champion her cause.

The problem is that we haven’t been championing liberty very effectively for quite a long time.

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By Col. Ralph Peters

No one who broke our laws to enter this country should ever decide who becomes our president, a member of Congress, a governor or mayor, or a member of the local school board. This is the non-negotiable “die line” those who love our country must defend: We cannot permit a huge criminal voting block to determine our future.

And every person who entered this country without our government’s formal permission is a criminal. Period.

Democrat Party operatives embed their public arguments for amnesty for eleven-million illegals in terms of human dignity and decency (they never mention votes).

Our laws are never mentioned. Nor is the multitude of illegal immigrant criminals who continue to violate those laws after breaking into our national home.

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By Rob Rojas

Nobody really likes paying their taxes. But, as the old adage about “death and taxes” conveys, there is a sense that taxes are as legitimate and as inevitable as death itself. In their acceptance of taxation, many well-meaning people forget that taxation violates our most basic moral principles.

If you have ever been to a kindergarten or a playground where very young children play, you might have realized that, although the kids are too young to understand many things, they already have a surprising sense of justice.

Take a toy away from a toddler who cannot yet speak a word, and you will often be met with a very clear protest. As far as the toddler is concerned, you have stolen her toy, you have initiated violence, and therefore it’s time to cry. The toddler’s reasoning probably isn’t this sophisticated, but the understanding is there.

Slightly older children are even more amazing. They understand that there is illegitimate violence (when a toy gets stolen), but they also understand that there is such a thing as legitimate violence as well, which is when the victimized child goes to the thieving child and takes her toy back. The astonishing thing is that the usual focus is on getting the toy back rather than punishing the aggressor. Punishment is a concept that they learn later, probably from us.

The initiation of violence is the act of an aggressor against you or against your property. This can be done through actual violence or through intimidation, because the mere threat of violence is an act of violence in itself. A good example would be a thief that points a gun at you to get your wallet without actually pulling the trigger. Another less obvious example is the way the government takes our money. To say that taxes are a form of theft may seem a bit over the top, but refuse to pay your taxes and you will be thrown in jail. Refuse to pay your property taxes and you will see who really owns your house.

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By J. Patrick Rhamey, Jr.

“Atlas Shrugged” is compelling, not for its heroes, but for its villains. Published in 1957, Rand’s description of politicians and lobbyists in a time of economic crisis is almost prophetic. These Washington insiders scheme behind closed doors to retain and expand their power. In elaborate press conferences, they attempt to convince the unsuspecting populace of their legislation’s necessity by vilifying productive companies and portraying their own destructive, self-serving designs as being in the interests of the advancement of equality, stability, and progress.

For instance, in Atlas Shrugged, the lobbyist Wesley Mouch decries the capitalist Hank Rearden’s invention of a wonderful alloy that is stronger than steel. And last week, in the real world, Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. took to the house floor to declare that Steve Jobs’s iPad was killing jobs. Congress must, according to Jackson, recognize that Apple is driving companies such as Barnes & Noble and Borders out of business, and the company should be stopped in the interests of fairness.

Jackson decried Congress for failing to foster “protection for jobs here in America to ensure that the American people are being put to work.” It’s as if he wanted us to believe the printing press was harmful to the economy because it decreased the demand for scribes. Such a condemnation of a successful business and a demand for protection of failing industries could easily have been lifted directly from Rand’s novel.

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By Dr. Joel Wade

“I just don’t trust that people are smart enough to make the right choices. Do you really think that there are enough intelligent people to have this kind of freedom?”

This is a sentiment that I’ve heard many times from seemingly good hearted people on the left. It’s a very telling window into a very troubling belief system.

Most arguments for the expansion of government power boil down to distrust. Distrust that poor people will be taken care of; distrust that businesses will run without corruption and abuse; distrust that people will take care of their own retirement, health care, and safety needs, etc.

The list is endless, and so long as enough people remain convinced that (other) people are basically not trustworthy, they will continue to support the illusion that the government can somehow correct for this shortcoming and make it all okay.

Note that “other” qualifier. Oddly, leftists always talk about other people and never themselves.

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By Marc Stevens

I’ve mentioned on the radio show a few times about sending the IRS and other tax agencies affidavits. The affidavits state we are terrified of the IRS and only file returns and report financial transactions out of terror of being attacked, put in jail and having all our property stolen. I’m encouraging everyone, if you file or report to the IRS and other tax agencies, send an affidavit of fear with the return. Let them know you are only complying out of a sense of terror, not because you think there is a legitimate obligation. You may comply, but you will not conceal the threats and coercion they used to get compliance. We will not help them make it look legitimate.

There are several reasons for this, and you’ll see it’s another tool to help bring about a voluntary society, building the free market.

It makes the bureaucrats aware of the violence.

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By William H. Gross

That adorable skunk, Pepé Le Pew, is one of my wife Sue’s favorite cartoon characters. There’s something affable, even romantic about him as he seeks to woo his female companions with a French accent and promises of a skunk bungalow and bedrooms full of little Pepés in future years. It’s easy to love a skunk – but only on the silver screen, and if in real life – at a considerable distance.

I think of Congress that way.

Every two or six years, they dress up in full makeup, pretending to be the change, vowing to correct what hasn’t been corrected, promising discipline as opposed to profligate overspending and undertaxation, and striving to balance the budget when all others have failed. Oooh Pepé – Mon Chéri! But don’t believe them – hold your nose instead! Oh, I kid the Congress. Perhaps they don’t have black and white stripes with bushy tails. Perhaps there’s just a stink bomb that the Congressional sergeant-at-arms sets off every time they convene and the gavel falls to signify the beginning of the “people’s business.” Perhaps.

But, in all cases, citizens of America – hold your noses. You ain’t smelled nothin’ yet.

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By Charles Kadlec

Sometimes, the methods to produce results are counter-intuitive. For example, skillful pruning of grape vines is essential to the production of vineyards, and cutting back a rose bush promotes its growth. Based on experience, we can learn where cutting can lead to growth.

The following statement is at first just as counter-intuitive: A reduction in government spending will not slow job growth. In fact, the experience of the last two years provides compelling evidence that a reduction in government spending will lead to increased employment and output in the US economy.

Since 2008, annual federal spending less net interest has increased by $530 billion or 19%. Yet, even with February’s welcome gain of 192,000 jobs, there are 2.3 million fewer people employed today than in February 2009, the month before the Obama Administration turned on the spending spigots with the passage of its economic recovery plan. Over those 24 months, private sector employment has declined by 2.0 million. In spite of the rapid expansion of the Federal bureaucracy, government sector employment has fallen by 360,000.

Moreover, a comparison of these results to the recovery from the economic crisis of the early 1980s casts doubt on the Obama Administration’s claim that without the unprecedented increase in government spending, the recession would have been even worse and the recovery slower.

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By Joshua Hersh

Fed up with a president “who can’t make his mind up” as Libyan rebels are on the brink of defeat, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is looking to the exits.

At the tail end of her mission to bolster the Libyan opposition, which has suffered days of losses to Col. Moammar Gadhafi’s forces, Clinton announced that she’s done with Obama after
2012 — even if he wins again.

“Obviously, she’s not happy with dealing with a president who can’t decide if today is Tuesday or Wednesday, who can’t make his mind up,” a Clinton insider told The Daily. “She’s exhausted, tired.”

He went on, “If you take a look at what’s on her plate as compared with what’s on the plates of previous Secretary of States — there’s more going on now at this particular moment, and it’s like playing sports with a bunch of amateurs. And she doesn’t have any power. She’s trying to do what she can to keep things from imploding.”

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By Robin of Berkeley

One of the reasons I drifted so far left was because of a constant sense of outrage. It was like a steady drumbeat in my head: Capitalism? Patently unfair! Unequal pay for women? Outrageous!

Of course, out here in Berkeley, I was in good company, surrounded by the multitudes up in arms most hours of the day. There’s even a popular bumper sticker around town that captures the general vibe: If You’re Not Outraged, You’re Not Paying Attention.

However, once I snapped out of my leftist trance, I realized something startling: I was outraged about all of the wrong things. In fact, leftist outrage is derived not from our Higher Selves, but from another place entirely: the lowly self.

Not only is the left’s outrage ego-based, but it is rooted in greed. Take the left’s centerpiece issue, social and economic justice. What do those flowery phrases actually mean, anyway? Aren’t they just doublespeak for envy, coveting one’s neighbor, and a gimme-gimme mentality?

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By Ulster Man

None other than Franklin D Roosevelt warned against public employees having the right to collective bargaining, warning that such a condition could put at risk the essential functions of government. Now decades following Roosevelt’s advice, America is now witness to the ever growing and increasingly dangerous folly and fantasy that so permeates labor union America.

With mad-dog protesters packing the Wisconsin capitol, attacking Republican state legislators as they enter, Wisconsin congressman Paul Ryan declared the revolutionary mood of Cairo Egypt had come to Wisconsin. Certainly many in the pro-labor union crowds embraced the comparison, declaring Wisconsin governor Scott Walker as being akin to recently removed Egyptian dictator Hasni Mubarak. (as well as Adolph Hitler, Benito Mussolini, etc…)

Ah, but such comparisons are incorrect if but for the simple fact that in Egypt, protests were enaged under the guise of fighting for democracy, whereas in Wisconsin, the labor unions are attempting to destroy democracy in the name of continued and high cost salary and benefit packages that now threaten to sink local and state budgets. The freely elected officials of the Wisconsin legislator are currently unable to vote on a state budget because a number of Democrats have fled the state, refusing to vote, abdicating their duty, and thus subverting the very principle of representative government. It is a tactic that exposes labor unions and their Democratic Party cohorts for the centralized government pay to play thugs they truly are.

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By Herman Cain

There is no denying it: America is the greatest country in the world. We are blessed with unparalleled freedoms and boundless prosperity that for generations have inspired an innovative and industrious people. America is exceptional.

American Exceptionalism is the standard that our laws reflect the understanding that we are afforded certain God-given rights that can never be taken away. We know that God, not government, bestows upon us these inalienable rights, and because of that, they must not be compromised by the whims of man. This makes us a unique nation, a nation that remains, as President Ronald Reagan once said, “a model and hope to the world.”

Unfortunately, some politicians have either forgotten or chosen to ignore the glory of our founding. In April 2009, President Obama told a reporter in Strasbourg, France: “I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.” In saying this, the president implied that American Exceptionalism is nothing terribly special and instead simply chalked it up to the romanticism of patriotism.

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By John Ellis

Why is Obama so disinclined to use the power at his disposal? His diffidence about humanitarian emergencies is one of the most mystifying features of his presidency, and one of its salient characteristics. These crises—in Tehran two years ago, in Cairo last month, in Tripoli now—produce in him a lame sort of lawyerliness. He lists the relevant rights and principles and then turns to procedural questions, like…consultations.

The Obama Administration has largely avoided this kind of withering criticism in the past. But events are changing that. More and more people who ordinarily support the president are wondering whether he understands that he’s no longer Senator Obama, he’s President Obama. They’re looking for presidential leadership on the global stage and they’re not seeing it.

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