Election 2016 – the Elephant in the Room

Here Come the Elephants!

Why is it that people often skirt the obvious?
Do they not see it?
Do they not wish to acknowledge it?
When people refuse to discuss the most obvious dominating and overwhelming issue at hand, we say there’s an elephant in the room.

Regarding Election 2016, there is more than one elephant in the room, and the elephants will soon run away with the election, so we may as well acknowledge them and start discussing them.

Pundits agree that this 2016 election is already different, historic, perplexing and unpredictable.  What they now need to acknowledge and to discuss are the dominant issues steering this election, or the elephants in the room.

From Swans to Elephants

We have previously discussed unexpected transformative historical events which steer the subsequent course of history, called Black Swans.  Black Swans are unpredictable determinants of history which may or may not be possible to control.  Black Swan theory is a serious political science theory documented in the political literature and quoted by the 9/11 Commission.

In the present 2016 election, we have seen the arrival of a bevy of Black Swans – led by the transformative and unexpected success of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign (note: Black Swan events are simply unexpected, not necessarily either bad or good).

But now we switch to the elephant analogy, because numerous Black Swans have arrived, and media and pundits seem to be in denial, refusing to discuss them. Media was slow to acknowledge the Trump phenomenon, and they have yet to acknowledge several other important determinants in this election- hence the undiscussed dominating forces become the Elephants.

What are these Elephants?

So what are all these elephants?

1. Donald Trump’s phenomenal success and the reasons for it.
2. The reason why we had 17 (!) Republican candidates.
3. The “Big Rule Switch” that occurred surreptitiously at the 2012 Republican Convention in Tampa, and is now controlling and complicating this 2016 election.
4. Discussion of whether Primaries and Caucuses are a transient and meaningless experiment.
5. Analyzing what the Super Tuesday Primary numbers really show us.
6. Determining what new elements are influencing the outcome of this 2016 election in place of Primaries and Caucuses.

So let’s look at these Elephants one-by-one.

Elephant #1
The Reason for Donald Trump’s Phenomenal Success

The reason for Donald Trump’s phenomenal success is not anger of the American people, as pundits often postulate in exasperation, failing to find a better explanation.

The real reason for Donald Trump’s phenomenal success is the fact that the American people realize that sometimes it takes a bully to subdue a bully.  But that’s not a politically correct suggestion, so nobody mentions it.

It was very amusing to watch the progressive CNN commentators looking quite panicked on Super Tuesday while discussing Donald’s proposed autocratic tactics and contrasting them with Ted Cruz’s promotion and adherence to Constitutional guidelines.  Who would have thought that progressives could ever welcome the idea of Ted Cruz, even if by contrast to Donald Trump?!

In view of the Democrat party’s escalating Alinsky tactics in recent decades, our confidence in the ability of a controlled Christian gentleman diplomat like, say, Ben Carson, to win the culture war can be shaken.

Americans love the way Donald Trump takes no nonsense from the left and fights back. His counterpunches almost seem appropriate when dealing with practiced Alinskyites like Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.

Donald Trump not only hits back, but hits back harder– as he did going after Bill Clinton’s sexual history when Hillary accused Trump of sexism. In Donald Trump’s own words, both Clintons “had a very bad weekend”  after Donald was through with them on that issue.

“Can he/she beat Hillary?” is a common litmus test for Republican candidates in this 2016 election, and Donald Trump passes that litmus test.

That is not to say that Donald’s techniques are the best ones in the long run, particularly on the world stage, but we can all appreciate how satisfying it is to see a bully creamed.

Aside: we do need to ask ourselves whether we want to replace one bully with another, and whether a David could slay a Goliath more easily than a second Goliath could do the job, particularly with the assistance of a nation at prayer. We should remember that there is a contrast between the behavior of a Christian and that of a Progressive.

Elephant #2
Why Did We Have 17 Republican Candidates?

.

.

Why 17 Candidates?

.Because there were 17 extremely talented, qualified, and patriotic men and women who were so dismayed at the destructive Progressive agenda of the Obama Administration that they were willing to run for office, to volunteer to captain a sinking ship.

Just as Americans flocked to the polls in 2014 and are flocking to the polls now in 2016 to reverse the progressive dictates of the present Obama administration, so too candidates are flocking to run for President as if to throw themselves sacrificially on the progressive hand grenade.

Note that the vast majority of these candidates are very conservative, and if one counts primary votes for conservatives versus liberals rather than counting votes for individuals, Donald Trump’s supporters are far outnumbered by Americans supporting conservative candidates.

Note also that the Rules of the Republican Party allow for such eventualities, and provide for a brokered convention when one candidate is not able to collect the support of the Party majority.  The brokered convention then does the job of eliminating candidates through a series of votes until one candidate finally achieves a majority.

Elephant #3
The “Big Rule Switch” in Rule 40(b)

Another important Elephant that never seems to be discussed by media is the “Big Rule Switch” that occurred surreptitiously at the 2012 Republican Convention in Tampa, and is now controlling and complicating this 2016 election.

This is important: so pay attention!

The Republican Party has always regarded Primaries in an advisory capacity, particularly since some states have allowed anyone, not just Republicans to vote in a Republican primary.  In recent decades, there have been numerous illegitimate attempts by progressives to hijack the Republican Party via rule changes.

The most recent attempt involved Mitt Romney’s supporters in 2012 succeeding in introducing changes into the Rules of the Republican Party to exclude Ron Paul from participation in the Republican Convention and leaving Mitt Romney as the Presumptive Nominee.

Under the previous rules a candidate needed a plurality (most votes) in 5 State Primaries to go to the Convention.  Two men cleared this hurdle in 2012 – Mitt Romney and Ron Paul.

Mitt Romney supporters managed in 2012 to get the bar to be set higher- suddenly, on the eve of the Republican Convention in Tampa in 2012, the rules were changed so that a candidate needed to get a majority (51% of votes) in 8 State Primaries to go on to the Convention.  This “Big Rule Switch” in Rule 40(b) excluded Ron Paul from consideration, and handed the nomination to Mitt Romney.

Today, this same “Big Rule Switch” that helped liberal Mitt Romney to get nominated is getting in the way of liberal Donald Trump.  Despite his obvious popularty and clear ability to get the plurality in 5 States, he has not been able to get the majority in 8 States (or in ANY State).  It is looking like NO CANDIDATE will clear the new “Big Rule Switch” bar, and presumably all remaining candidates will go to the convention. Then, after the first vote, it will be possible to add additional names into the running, including those who suspended their campaigns like Scott Walker, and those who never declared candidacy, like Sarah Palin.

The “Big Rule Switch” May Lead Us Into a Brokered Convention

So Mitt Romney’s supporters in 2012 created a rule change which might force us into a “brokered convention” in 2016.  This can actually be a good thing– when Republicans cannot agree on a nominee, having a run-off at the election where candidates compete again and additional candidates can be proposed is a good idea.  This eliminates the danger of nominating a candidate who is backed by less than half the Party – as seems to be the case right now with Donald Trump.

Despite his obvious popularity, Donald Trump has not received a majority, over 50% in ANY state so far, and certainly not in 8 States, so he cannot be considered the Presumptive Nominee by any measure under the “Big Rule Switch” of 2012.

Confirming at the convention that a majority of Republicans are on board with nominating Donald would be a prudent precaution.  Abraham Lincoln and Ronald Reagan were products of a brokered convention, so this is not something to fear.

Elephant #4
Could Primaries and Caucuses Be a Transient and Meaningless Experiment?

Should the  approximately 2500 Republican Delegates who are elected to represent their States at the Republican Convention be bound to vote according to Primary and Caucus results obtained six months prior to the Convention?

According to Curly Haugland, National Committeeman from the North Dakota Republican State Committee, and member of the RNC Rules Committee, for the past 90 years RNC rules have prohibited the binding of Republican delegates.  RNC rules continue to protect the right of each delegate to The Republican National Convention to vote their personal choice on issues coming before the convention, and for the candidate of their choice to receive the party’s nomination.  Senators and Congress members have this right to use judgement, and so do Republican Party delegates.

In recent times, progressives who would like to hijack the Republican Party and the media which supports them have been pressuring Republicans to rely more and more on Primary results, rather than allowing the Convention to be the final determining factor in nomination as it has been in the past.  Some States have even passed laws requiring delegates to be bound by Primary results.  But the Rules of the Republican Party clearly indicate that no State can supersede the Rules of the Republican Party or the freedom of their delegates.

The media pressure and spin has been so great in recent decades that many Americans do not even realize that Primary votes are only advisory in nature, are not binding, that Democrats and Independents participate in Republican Primaries, and that Republican delegates also carry the responsibility to keep candidates accountable to the principles outlined in the Republican Party Platform.

Relying on Primary results might sound democratic, but  giving undue weight to the Primaries actually permits outsiders to hijack the Party more easily and allows in candidates (like Mitt Romney) who do not support the entire Republican Party platform.

Relying heavily on Primary results for nomination also gives more power to money interests, by preserving the results obtained during the Primary season, and taking away the right of elected delegates to use their judgement at the Conventions, as our Senators and Congressmen do when they vote in Washington D.C.

The idea of “binding” delegates to the results of the Primaries also prevents delegates from considering events that occur between the Primaries to the Convention in the nomination process.  What if a Republican candidate was subject to prosecution by the FBI as Democrat Hillary Clinton may be, would delegates still feel bound to vote for that candidate at the Convention?

The idea of holding Primaries and Caucuses to advise Republican delegates of their Party member’s interests was a good idea in the past.  But in this progressive world which legislates allowing Democrats to vote in Republican Primaries, and in which political hijackings occur frequently, the idea of binding has become preposterous, and even the concept of holding Primaries and Caucuses should be reevaluated.

Elephant #5
Super Tuesday Numbers – What Do They Mean?

This 2016 Super Tuesday’s Numbers show three remarkable things:

• Donald Trump did not get a majority (over 50%) in ANY State, let alone 8 States.
  By the 2012 “Big Rule Switch,” he is not the Presumptive Nominee.
• Donald Trump still has only 319 delegates (if you believe in binding) of a required 1,237 to win. He has one quarter of the delegates needed to win, but he cannot even count on those in a climate in which delegates could feel more allegiance to the Party Platform than to a candidate who is not a “social conservative.”
• Republican turnout was phenomenal compared both with previous Republican turnout and compared with Democrat turnout, which was much reduced. So unless an awful lot of Democrats suddenly stayed home on Super Tuesday, this means that a large number of Democrats “turned” and voted for Republicans. American Thinker claims that we are witnessing an incredibly shrinking Democrat Party in this election.

Other conclusions can be drawn from the Super Tuesday numbers as well-

1/3 Trump versus 2/3 Social Conservatives
(AKA Serious Christians)

Since Donald Trump has been averaging 35% of the Republican vote in most States, the other four candidates share the other 65%.

So what?
So here is another Elephant in the room which is never pointed out – that the other four candidates, Cruz, Rubio, Kasich and Carson, are all “social conservatives” (like me).

What does this mean?
Being “social conservatives” means that they uphold certain moral values – opposing abortion, preserving traditional marriage, and defending religious liberty in the United States. These are, incidentally, fundamental Christian values, or “moral” values.
This means that 65% of voters in Republican Primaries, and that includes some Independents and Democrats, vote “social conservative,” and include morality in their conservatism, not just fiscal conservatism.

It is not surprising that Republican voters and most Republican candidates support “social conservative values” since the Republican Party Platform supports “social conservative” values.

This observation should make for some interesting sorting of votes and delegates at the Republican Convention, and Donald Trump could struggle to reach his desired 51% for nomination. As candidates drop out, social conservative voters will probably go to another social conservative, and not to Donald Trump.

So if you tabulate the Super Tuesday numbers as Trump (“economy rules!”) versus Social Conservatives (“morality rules!”), we could be in for a very interesting convention.  We really could end up electing a poorly known morally upstanding person like Abraham Lincoln or Ronald Reagan– not only from the original 17 candidates, but from other sources as well.  Some have even suggested that Sarah Palin is not out of the question.

Last But Not Least- Elephant #6
If This Election Breaks With the Past, What Are the New Rules and the New Determinants for this Election?

The previous 5 issues affecting this 2016 Election indicate that we are breaking new ground here.
We can speculate on who may try what, and what the outcome will ultimately be.
But as mentioned initially, Black Swans are never predictable, and rarely controllable, except through prayer.

Both sides, Republican Progressives and Republican Conservatives, as well as those Democrats who are trying to hijack the Republican Party (from whose ranks Donald Trump has not been entirely out ruled!) may try many of the above approaches to steer things their own way-

• bluffing and claiming victory based on legally non-binding primaries
• threatening and coercing delegates to obtain their votes (happened in 2012, when 400 Republican delegates filed a lawsuit alleging violence and intimidation)
• trying to dominate Republican Rule Committee or Republican Platform Committee to make last minute eve-of-the election changes as was done in 2012
• introducing new candidates during the brokered convention
• trying to convince and/or intimidate delegates that they are indeed “bound”
• using media to spin numbers to their own advantage
• there are many more surprising things that are bound to happen but which are not predictable

What Should We Do?

What should we do?
Me?
I plan to sit back, watch, pray, participate in some conservative activism, and vote.
You should too.
See my election guide from 2014- the same rules still apply- vote for the most moral candidate, pro-life topping the list, and pray.

I truly believe that we are watching the moral reawakening of America, which is guided by an interaction between Church and State – from the bottom up, not religion imposed from above.  I am very excited about Christians having the chance to reclaim our Judeo-Christian roots and our Constitution, and believe that we are now watching this process, emboldened by our delightful Mr. Trump.  The morality that will result will be a synthesis of what we all believe and what we agree on. Like the Constitution, it will be encompassed democratically, grass roots up, in our laws.

What Should We Expect?

CONVERSION OF ST. DONALD?

Should we expect more surprises along the way?
Absolutely.

Who knows, with the surprising nature of Black Swans, Donald Trump could even be our St. Paul!
(Although I am not holding my breath.)

God Bless America, and God Bless Our Candidates!
Any one of the Republican contenders will be an improvement over the Progressive Agenda of the last eight years.

My favorite?
Dr. Ben Carson.
Yes, I know he just announced that he “sees no political path forward” after Super Tuesday’s results.

But re-entry through a brokered convention would not be a political path forward.
Could the good doctor be avoiding the political, high-spending, favor-exchanging world of the Primaries, and be planning to step into the Convention directly and apolitically, where the market of ideas is tested by delegates who uphold the Republican Party Platform?

Time will tell.
That would be one elegant and unexpected possible result.
When you interconnect Church and State, many new options become possible for the American people, with God in their corner.

The Biggest Issue of All

God is a best example of the elephants in the room of American politics- a very large, important and crucial issue that everyone is acutely aware of, but nobody wants to talk about.
The Freedom of Religion Foundation has tried to ensure that.
But we won’t count God as an Elephant; too disrespectful.
However, if you count God in, you will have a smoother ride.
In politics, and everywhere else.

Presidential Nominees -Who Gets to Choose Them?

or

What’s a Delegate to Do?

Note: This article was inspired by the work of Curly Haugland on Republican Presidential Candidate selection at Will Republicans Have a Primary Or A Convention, And Who Gets To Decide?

The Problem- “Binding” of Votes

There has been much controversy in recent years over the question of “binding” Republican delegates in presidential primaries and conventions.

What is a delegate?  A delegate is a person designated to act for or represent another or others; deputy; representative, as in a political convention.

Binding is a policy that does not allow delegates at a presidential convention to follow their own judgment or to insist on the party platform when voting for a candidate at the convention, but obliges them to vote only for the candidates who were selected in the primary or caucus selection of candidates in their state months previous to the Republican Convention.

So the question becomes how can a delegate best act for or represent others in the Republican convention?  Does a delegate represent other Republicans better when the delegate is “bound” to vote for a particular individual, or does the delegate represent other Republicans better when he/she is free to use their own judgement, as other elected officials, like Senators and Representatives in the United States Congress do?

In the Republican Party, binding was forbidden by RNC rules since 1923, and delegates have had the freedom to use personal judgment.
But attempts have been made in recent years to introduce binding into RNC rules, with a great deal of confusion resulting.

Pros and Cons

Those who advocate binding say binding is democratic, represents the will of the people, and should not be overturned at the convention by delegates who do not wish to be bound by the popular vote.
Political donors promote binding because their investments in candidates at the primary level could be wiped out by unexpected votes at the convention if delegates were not bound after the primary.

Those who oppose binding and advocate freedom of conscience for delegates say that outsiders, who are permitted to vote in Republican primaries in 24 States now, have no right to hijack the party at the primaries for an agenda that may even be at odds with the party platform.

These issues become particularly important as we approach the 2016 Presidential Election, which has been labeled the most unique, yet pivotal, nomination process in the entire history of the Republican Party.

Some Crucial Background on Ballot Access

Who is right?
Pro-binding or anti-binding advocates?
What are the rules?

If we start with the question “What are the rules governing nominations for President in the United States?” it helps to understanding the modern dilemma on “binding” of delegates.

Ballotpedia, a respected impartial political news source, explains the ballot access process for presidential candidates:

According to Ballotpedia, there are three ways that a person can get on the ballot for President:

• The individual can seek the nomination of a political party. Political parties are private organizations in which like-minded individuals with similar goals have banded together to sponsor a nominee for president who upholds their organization’s priorities and agenda or platform.

• They can get on the ballot for President independently. This involves petitioning each state to have their names printed on the general election ballot. Each petition involves complex procedures designed by State lawmakers to prevent non-serious candidates from appearing on the ballot. In 2016, it would also involve the collection of more than 900,000 signatures in support of that candidate.

• The person can run as a write-in candidate. In most states, this involves filing some paperwork in advance of the election. And, of course, it involves persuading millions of people to write the candidate’s name in on the ballot during the general election.

What’s the Easiest Way for a Person to Run for President?

It is pretty clear that the first option, getting a party to nominate you for president, is easier than the other two options. In the first option, the party does much of the work for the candidate. The party offers the unique ability to effectively organize and mobilize voters. The party also contributes a history, a reputation and loyal members who will vote for the candidate.

Two such major parties have dominated the political landscape in the United States for over a hundred years- Democratic and Republican parties. These parties not only help candidates, but they also help voters. Once voters have identified a party whose platform they approve, they do not have to repeat the hard work of gauging each presidential candidate individually on each issue and deciding which one to back for each election. The party they support and trust does this evaluation for them.

Political Warfare

In the past, it seemed honest common sense that only individuals who support a party platform would consider running under the umbrella of that party.

The idea that someone who disagrees with the party platform would try to use that party to get elected would clearly represent a form of dishonesty, even of hijacking.
However today, attempts to hijack political parties occur.

Why Would Anyone Want to Hijack a Party?

Someone may want to hijack a political party for a number of reasons.

The reasons include circumventing the tedious application process to numerous individual States, avoiding the collection of nearly a million signatures, and the attractive nature of jumping on a wagon that is already well under way and is well stocked.  A deceitful person could even see hijacking of the opposition party as an opportunity to weaken the opposition party from the inside.

Click Image to Enlarge

The Republican Party’s major opponent, the Democrat Party, has unfortunately demonstrated numerous times their willingness to use an unethical set of tactics called Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals.  Hillary Clinton wrote her undergraduate thesis on Alinsky’s philosophy and was offered a job to work with him in 1968.  Barak Obama taught Alinksy Tactics while he was a professor.  Alinsky’s book Rules for Radicals is dedicated to Lucifer (Satan, the Father of Lies) and promotes the use of any immoral tactics to achieve one’s goals. The behavior of both President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton  during the past 8 years has illustrated time and again the devious unethical tactics used routinely by the Democrat Party.

Democrats seem to be riddled with unscrupulous agendas much more so than other groups of Americans or than Republicans. As an aside, you could read about the circus that went on in Madison, Wisconsin when Democrats decided to recall Republican Governor Walker because they did not like legislation that Republicans were enacting in Wisconsin.  I had a front-row seat at that circus, and reported on many unscrupulous behind-the scenes events, including shocking events involving State Supreme Court Judges at the Wisconsin State Supreme Court.  Events such as these make President Nixon’s Watergate seem like naughty child’s play, but the media does not even attempt to hold Democrats accountable for their unethical behavior in 2016, and amateur bloggers like me have to do the work of the media.

Dealing With Reality

So reality dictates today that we have to deal with individuals who present themselves to a political party for nomination, while disagreeing with a major portion of that party’s political platform or agenda. The party has to watch out for hijackers, or Trojan horses, or wolves in sheep’s clothing- both among the candidates, and among primary voters.

This is where the supervision of trusted, elected party delegates who have earned the trust of the party through demonstrated volunteer service comes in, helping to identify and eliminate impostors and hijackers. Delegates have been entrusted the job of being the guardian angels of the party’s ethics and of the party’s platform.

Hijacking can occur not only at the candidate level, but at the primary voter level as well. Twenty-four states now allow the general public to vote in primaries for nominees of other parties. So when Democrats and Independents and undeclared voters are permitted to choose the Republican Party’s nominee, clearly the Republican Party no longer has control over its own organization. There is even the potential for organized busloads of opponents, sometimes without proper identification, to vote numerous times in primaries in order to sabotage their opponents’ candidate selection.

Isn’t That a Bit Paranoid?

Unfortunately, the scenarios described above are not imagined, but have already surfaced at the Iowa caucuses in this 2016 election.

Democrat candidate Bernie Sanders has accused his Democrat opponent Hillary Clinton of infiltrating the Iowa caucuses with out-of-state paid staffers.  A pretty serious accusation, considering that Hillary won the Iowa Caucuses by only 0.29%.

Equivalently shocking, there is video documentary published February 10, 2016, of Out of State Voters and Non-Residents Offered Ballots in New Hampshire Presidential Primary.  So apparently, attempts to hijack the Primaries are in full force today.

Back to Binding Delegates- Democratic or Not?

So the binding of delegates is not a simple democratic procedure as many media sources represent it. In fact, binding of delegates can work against democracy in numerous ways:

• Binding of delegates allows outsiders to help choose the Republican nominee at the Primaries.
• Binding of delegates allows candidates who oppose the Party platform to be nominated.
• Binding of delegates misleads voters into thinking a candidate represents something other than they really represent.
• Binding of delegates does not allow delegates to take into account all the events that transpire in the half year between the primaries and the convention.
• Binding of delegates is unfair to those who have built the Republican Party, which is, after all, a private association with freedoms guaranteed by the First Amendment to associate with politically like-minded individuals.
• Binding of delegates allows the infiltration of political party by opponents.
• Binding encourages money-driven nominations rather than idea-driven or character-driven nominations.
• Binding of delegates has never been permitted by the Rules of the Republican Party.

The above points illustrate that it can very reasonably be argued that the binding of delegates is NOT democratic, but subverts the democratic process and facilitates the hijacking of half of America’s votes.

Hijacking Not Allowed

If a person does not agree with a particular party’s platform, they should not be allowed to represent that party, or to change that party by such devious means.

An outsider cannot join your off-road jeep club and insist that you switch your club’s agenda to knitting.
Your neighbors, no matter how many of them get together and agree, cannot hijack your car from your garage because they do not own it.

But Didn’t the RNC Introduced Binding, and Isn’t Binding Binding?

So why are so many under the impression that binding was introduced into RNC rules by amendment, and that binding is now obligatory?

The problem is that recent political warfare has included numerous attempts by progressives to alter the political agenda of the Republican Party with amendments and to divert its candidates.
These attempts have been fraudulent, and they cause internal contradictions in the RNC rules, which by definition (governed by Robert’s Rules of Order) nullify the contradictory progressive amendments.

Did You Just Say Progressives in the Republican Party?

Yes, there actually are progressives in the Republican Party.
Let’s clarify something about progressives at this point. Etymologically speaking, one would think that progressives were people who represented progress in society.

Yet today’s progressive has wishfully and somewhat narcissistically labeled his or her own fast-paced, radical social and economic experimentation, which most often ends in economic failure and social disaster, as progressive. Not only have they prematurely declared their experiments to represent progress, but they have also tried to dictate that all others follow their foolhardy misguided example.

One example of misguided progessivism is Michelle Obama’s suggestion last year that discarded school lunches be used to fuel cars.  The idea sounds great on the surface- let’s not let anything go to waste!- but when you do the calculations of what it would cost to transform school lunches into fuel for cars, the fuel would end up costing $280 per gallon.

Today’s impulsive and unwise progressive is more aptly named a regressive.
So let’s get to some of the regressive, fraudulent and invalid amendments they tried to introduce into the RNC rules.

 Regressive Attempts to Amend RNC Rules

According to Curly Haugland, National Committeeman from the North Dakota Republican State Committee, and member of the RNC Rules Committee, for the past 90 years RNC rules have prohibited the binding of Republican delegates.  RNC rules continue to protect the right of each delegate to The Republican National Convention to vote their personal choice on issues coming before the convention, and for the candidate of their choice to receive the party’s nomination.

The Rules of the Republican Party  can be changed via prescribed procedures, but changes can occur only once every four years, on the eve of the Republican Convention.  Once the rules are established, the convention proceeds according to those rules, and no further changes can be made until the eve of the next convention four years later.

There have been attempts by regressives to change the rules in recent years, and today, the RNC rules actually do state that binding of delegates can occur (Rule 16).  But Curly Haugland points out that the binding language was introduced illegitimately by deceit and by trickery, by staff who did not have the authority to change the rules, and furthermore, that the attempted binding rule is actually contradicted by other RNC rules which are still on the books (e.g. Rules 37 and 38).  Contradictions are governed by Roberts Rules of Order, which state that any motion that conflicts with other existing rules is null and void.

So despite the fact that binding has been introduced into the RNC Rules, binding is actually null and void.
Binding is not binding.

All-Out War

The struggle between proponents of binding and those defending their rights to vote their conscience led to a serious clash in 2012.

Over 400 Republican delegates filed a Federal lawsuit against the Republican National Committee and Reince Priebus the Chairman, alleging that violence and intimidation were used against delegates in an effort to control how they voted.  These delegates refused to be bound and insisted on their right to vote their conscience.

Despite the fact that the court ordered the dispute to be settled via Alternative Dispute Resolution, the exhibits included in the complaint included a copy of a legal opinion offered by Jennifer Sheehan, Associate Counsel to the Republican National Committee, which clearly states that Delegates are allowed to vote for the individual of their choice, regardless of whether that person is officially placed into nomination.

Regressive Rules Can Boomerang

We’ve already mentioned the boomerang path some “progressive” ideas take, like Michelle Obama’s attempt to force children to eat food they don’t like, then to turn their discarded lunches into $280 per gallon fuel for cars.

The thing is, most progressive regressive ideas fail, and come back to bite the people who initiated them.  Any good scientist will tell you that most experiments fail, and it is the failed experiments that ultimately lead you toward figuring out what really  does work.

And regressive rule changes in the RNC rules are no exception- they boomerang and come back to bite you.

Changing MORE Rules

Presidential candidates (like Mitt Romney) who are powerful enough to influence the appointment of delegates in the Republican Party, can get their delegates to introduce changes into the RNC rules on the eve of the convention once every 4 years.  And guess what they try to introduce?  Rules which favor that candidate.  And so, on the eve of the 2012 Tampa Republican convention, more rules were changed.

Previous to 2012, in order to go on to the convention, a candidate had to win a plurality of votes in the primaries of 5 states; that is, to receive more votes in 5 states than any of his/her competitors did.  But on the eve of the 2012 Tampa Convention, this rule (Rule 40) was changed, in order to make Mitt Romney the Presumptive Nominee and to prevent Ron Paul, who had received a plurality of votes in 5 states, from challenging Mitt Romney.  The bar was raised to require a majority of votes (more than 50% instead of just the highest number) in 8 states (instead of in 5 states). This rule change made on the eve of the 2012 Convention succeeded in excluding Ron Paul, and Mitt Romney went on to become the Republican nominee.

Here Comes the Boomerang!

Well, here we are now in 2016.

The 2016 Republican field is much larger and more competitive than 2012, so the majority (50%) that Mitt Romney and Ron Paul got in 2012 is much harder to get.
We have a veritable flock of great candidates coming up on stage.  So much so that they cannot even fit onto one stage, and Republican debates are split into two sessions.
At the rate things are going, even the front runners do not seem capable of getting 50% of the vote, because the vote is spread over so many candidates.

What will happen?
The very rules that helped Mitt Romney are now getting in the way of many candidates.
So, there will be no “Presumptive Nominee.”

Many candidates may get to the convention, and rule changes are being planned for the eve of the July 1016 Convention.
As a result, this year, the candidate selection process may occur at the convention, and not at the primaries.
Candidates who do not have a majority of delegates are being encouraged to “go the distance” to Cleveland and not to drop out. 
Delegates are being encouraged to vote their conscience, and to select a nominee who represents the Party Platform.

When delegates do not feel “bound,”  the handlers and influence peddlers will lose control over the convention.  The convention will be in the hands of the delegates of the Republican party.
So what worked for progressives in 2012 in getting a much more liberal candidate (Mitt Romney) ushered into the Republican Party, may work against the present most liberal candidate, Donald Trump.
Donald Trumps’s hopes of being the Presumptive Nominee may have been sabotaged by the rule change in 2012 that was designed to help liberal candidates like Mitt Romney, and presumably Donald Trump.
The boomerang has returned.

Anybody Placing Bets?

So who’s placing bets on the mad dash to change the rules again on the eve of this 2016 Cleveland Republican Convention?
Will the rules be changed?
Will there be a repetition of delegate intimidation?
Will Reince Priebus and the National Republican Committee behave and let democracy work, particularly since they were forced to recognize the delegates’ right to conscience after the lawsuit in 2012?
Some have even speculated that this convention could yield wild surprises, such as the nomination of people who had not even declared themselves as candidates for nomination, like Sarah Palin.

What We Need

What we need at this point is patriotism, courage, strength of character and prayer.
This is an opportunity for Americans to take back the Republican Party, to behave in a way that is faithful to the Constitution and to the Republican Party Platform, which supports the Constitution.
We need power to be returned to the delegates as it was originally designed and intended.
And that power will not return by itself. It has to be taken by courageous men and women.
At the 2016 Republican Convention in Cleveland.

So What’s a Delegate to Do?

• A Delegate is to act like a patriot.
• A delegate is to help take back America, so that this Judeo-Christian democratic republic can continue to thrive and succeed and does not turn into a regressive experimental Godless socialist state which is the trajectory that Obama and the Democrat Party are following.
• A delegate is to choose candidates of upstanding moral character who are pledged to upholding the platform of the Republican Party.
• A delegate really should read the new guide being prepared for Republican Party delegates which is being spearheaded by North Dakota Republican National Committeeman Curly Haugland, intended to make all delegates aware of the duties and responsibilities they assume as they fulfill their important role in the governance of the Republican Party. The working title of the guide is “Owner’s Manual for 2016 Republican National Convention Delegates. See RNC Delegates Top Priority:Recruiting Conservatives Into Party’s Precinct Committeemen Ranks.

READ THE GUIDE THAT’s COMING!

Impeachment Back in the News

Impeachment is back in the news.
To impeach, or not to impeach?
Articles of impeachment against President Barack Obama were filed just a few weeks ago by a group of black American citizens, the National Black Republican Association (NBRA).
Throughout August, conservative constituents at towns halls have also been pressuring members of Congress to impeach the President.

• What has Barack Obama done to deserve this public outcry?
• What did other recent impeachment candidates do to deserve impeachment?
• How do Barack Obama’s offenses compare with the offenses of the last two Presidents to be impeached?
• Could impeachment of President Obama succeed, and what would it accomplish?

Blatant Lies and Lost Credibility

At the very least, whether successful or not, impeachment attempts expose the blatant lies and reflect the loss of credibility of a President.

Blatant lies told by Presidents undermine not only their own authority, but also the Office of President of the United States.
Presidential lies undermine the credibility and moral integrity of our entire nation.

Comparing Articles of Impeachment

The articles of impeachment summarize accusations  made during an impeachment:

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Richard M. Nixon
Articles of Impeachment:

• Obstruction of Justice
• Abuse of Power
• Contempt of Congress

 “He has, acting personally and through his subordinates and agents, endeavored to . . . cause, in violation of the constitutional rights of citizens, income tax audits or other income tax investigations to be initiated or conducted in a discriminatory manner.“

-Articles of Impeachment against Richard M. Nixon, adopted by the House Judiciary Committee, July 29, 1974. Article II, Section 1

Results: Richard Nixon’s impeachment did not go to the House or Senate for trial, because Nixon first resigned in disgrace.

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William J. “Bill” Clinton
Articles of Impeachment:

• Perjury
• Obstruction of Justice

The judge wrote:
“Simply put, the president’s deposition testimony regarding whether he had ever been alone with Ms. (Monica) Lewinsky was intentionally false, and his statements regarding whether he had ever engaged in sexual relations with Ms. Lewinsky likewise were intentionally false….”

Results: Bill Clinton was Impeached by the House of Representatives, and acquitted by the U.S. Senate.  He received a contempt of court citation, and a suspension of his Arkansas law license, as well as a suspension from the U.S. Supreme Court bar.
Bill Clinton did not resign, and today seems unashamed of his misdeeds.
Incredibly, half of America seems to have little problem with Clinton’s moral and legal transgressions, as he continues to play a prominent role in the Democrat Party today in 2013, despite the public demolition of his integrity.
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Barack H. Obama
Articles of Impeachment filed by a “black American citizens”:

• Obstruction of Benghazi investigation
• Disclosure of grand jury material
• Authorization of DOJ to conduct Fast and Furious
• Authorization of IRS to release confidential information ot unauthorized individuals and organization
• Initiation of  discriminatory IRS audits
• Permission of unjustified NSA surveillance of 300 million average Americans
• Permission of DOJ to spy on over one hundred Associated Press Journalists and on Fox News Reporter James Rosen
• Thwarting Congress by failing to enforce laws including the Defense of Marriage Act, No Child Left Behind Act, and Affordable Care Act, and by directing immigrations officers to stop enforcing immigration law when Congress refused to pass his Dream Act.
• Violations of the Constitution, bypassing the US Senate to appoint 3 members of the National Labor Relations board and to appoint Richard Cordray to head the Consumer Financial Protection bureau.
• Intimidation of whistle blowers and bringing twice as many prosecutions against whistle blowers as all prior presidents combined.

WOW

Ten Articles of Impeachment.
That’s a first.
Black Americans accusing the first black President of tyranny and of despotism.
That’s even more of a first.

This nation has been very proud of the historically significant 2008 Presidential election, in which our first black President was elected.  America prides itself on freedom, on fairness, and on opportunity.  I am the child of poor Lithuanian immigrants, and love America deeply for it’s just (Judeo-Christian) system of government and law, and the resulting opportunities it offers to those who work hard and follow the rules.  My entire family has risen from poor immigrants to successful and prosperous Americans in less than one generation, thanks to the opportunities offered by this country.  Despite my conservative political beliefs, even I was impressed with this aspect of the 2008 Presidential election outcome-a tribute to what children of all backgrounds can achieve in the United States – because we have a fair and just country.

Reasons Not to Impeach

What a tragedy and heartache it would be if the first black President abused the office so badly that he had to be impeached.  This is the sentiment that probably prevents most of us from discussing the impeachment of Barack Obama.  Some Obama supporters state candidly that they refrain from opposing the President because he is black.  When black Americans start proposing impeachment, we know this man has really abused the authority granted to him as President. And when liberal black leaders start proposing impeachment, this man has really crossed the line.

If a Lithuanian were ever elected President, I (as a Lithuanian) would be pretty reluctant, pretty ashamed, and pretty hard-pressed to demand his impeachment.

Reasons to Impeach

Yes, I would be reluctant to impeach a Lithuanian.

But I would demand the impeachment nevertheless, because I know that true equality includes accountability and includes keeping ALL leaders subject to the law, not just some.

Lithuanians, or blacks, or any other group of human beings, are not well served by condoning the misdeeds of one of their members.  Protection of offenders carries the unspoken implication that the entire group is complicit.  Protection sends the message that the entire group is not capable of responsible and accountable behavior. Excusing unacceptable behavior can even carry the bigoted implication that better cannot be expected from this minority person.
Wise minorities, whether Lithuanian or black, would demand accountability from their President, in order to demonstrate that the malefactor is the exception, not the rule, in their group.

And So, Black Americans Accuse President Obama of a Long Train of Abuses and Usurpations

National Black Republican Association:

We, black American citizens, in order to free ourselves and our fellow citizens from governmental tyranny, do herewith submit these Articles of Impeachment to Congress for the removal of President Barack H. Obama, aka, Barry Soetoro, from office for his attack on liberty and commission of egregious acts of despotism that constitute high crimes and misdemeanors.

On July 4, 1776, the founders of our nation declared their independence from governmental tyranny and reaffirmed their faith in independence with the ratification of the Bill of Rights in 1791.  Asserting their right to break free from the tyranny of a nation that denied them the civil liberties that are our birthright, the founders declared:

“When a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.”  –  Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776.

Comparison of Charges

All three recent impeachment candidates, Nixon, Clinton and Obama, were clearly guilty of lies, and of mis-using the power of the Office of President.
Details of the accusations vary, and some overlap.

All three broke the law.
All three lied.

The articles of impeachment above show many MORE accusations against President Barack Obama than against Nixon and Clinton.

They include IRS discrimination, NSA spying, prosecution of whistleblowers, wiretapping of journalists, the torture program and the Benghazi cover-up. Obama’s troubles do not seem to stem from one error as in the case of Nixon or Clinton, but from numerous errors and numerous cover-ups.  The list of articles of impeachment reflect a pervasive and systematically unscrupulous administration.  Phrases like Chicago tactics, Imperial Presidency, and Gangster Government surface in the news.

Lucifer – Ricardo Bellver, Madrid, 1877

Perhaps this is not so surprising after all, in reference to the man, Obama, who used to teach  Alinksy Tactics (aka Satan’s handbook, or the antithesis of the Ten Commandments) in Chicago.

It is interesting to note that accusations against Nixon did include “income tax investigations to be initiated or conducted in a discriminatory manner,” an accusation very similar to the IRS discrimination recently tolerated and probably initiated by the Obama administration.

There has been much discussion of President Obama’s misdeeds and misrepresentations.  One discussion compares President Obama with President Nixon extensively, in an article entitled Obama’s Watergates, in which numerous parallels are drawn between Nixon and Obama.   The author, Victor Davis Hanson,  a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University, calls the Obama administration’s methods and aims “Nixonian to the core.”

Hanson predicts that the scandals, beginning with Benghazi, and continuing with the IRS, the Associated Press and James Rosen, as well as with Edward Snowden and the NSA, will not end until “the truth sets us all free.”  He predicts a long-drawn-out and sordid saga.

or

Hey, They’re Shooting at ME Now!

Background: The West Wing

The West Wing was a TV serial drama which aired from 1999 to 2006, during much of George W. Bush’s presidency, depicting a liberal White House administration.  Some speculate that the show’s popularity reflected the wishful  fantasies of liberals, who were frustrated with the somewhat conservative real administration occupying  the White House, and retreated into TV fantasies of a successful liberal White House for entertainment.

“If They’re Shooting at You…”

Charlie Young (played by Dule Hill)

In one episode of West Wing, the fictional character Charlie Young (Presidential aide), played by Dulé Hill, quotes his father as saying “If They’re Shooting at You, You Know You’re Doing Something Right!”

Charlie’s observation might in fact reflect the projection of a somewhat widespread radical progressive attitude today, an attitude in which passionate progressives feel entitled to use any methods, including morally and legally questionable ones, in combating their political opponents.  When analyzing their own opponents, radicals then project their own attitudes and methods onto them. If radicals might consider shooting their opposition when the opposition becomes too successful, radicals assume that conservatives would do the same.

A Fictional Shooting

The plot of West Wing actually included the shooting of the liberal President by right-wing extremists, who objected to the President’s young black aide (Charlie Young) dating the President’s white daughter.  The shooting was actually targeted at Charlie Young, the young black aide who dares to date the President’s daughter, with the President catching an unintended bullet during the attack.

Democrat shooting Ron Paul?

This slanderous plot reflected unscrupulous progressive attitudes on two levels.  Progressive producers of the show were clearly prepared to smear conservatives with damaging fictional plots implying that conservatives oppose interracial dating, and in fact oppose it so strongly that they shoot people over this issue.  In addition, by inventing such unthinkable plots, the progressives also betrayed their own level of comfort with underhanded and unscrupulous methods.

Imagine the converse.  What Tea Party conservative would have created an imaginary TV show about the Presidency, in which a conservative President like Rand Paul is shot by crazy Democrats who insist that all women work, and who are incensed at the fact that the President’s aide has a wife who does not work outside the home?  This plot would have been equally far-fetched, and slanderous to Democrats.

The use of such unscrupulous methods, like smearing conservatives with fictional TV programs, or shooting your political opposition when they are too successful,  is called Alinsky tactics.   Radical progressives seem to be using Alinsky tactics with a rapidly accelerating frequency today.

Alinsky Tactics Today

Global

Hillary Rodham Clinton lying to the United Nations

Few liberals are aware that Hillary Clinton’s undergraduate senior thesis at Wellesley College focused on an analysis of Alinsky tactics, or that Hillary refrained in that thesis from addressing the morality or legality of such tactics.  Hillary Clinton also seemed to employ some Alinsky’s methods in her recent position as United States Secretary of State.  This included lying to the United Nations to misrepresent Catholic Church teaching, in order to to expand global abortion, and more recently, lying to cover up the Benghazi fiasco.

National

Even the “mainstream media” has acknowledged in recent weeks the increasingly underhanded methods used by the Obama administration to combat their political opponents.  The triple Obama administration scandals which are now surfacing involve the abuse of power by the IRS to undermine conservative organizations, the  abuse of power by the Department of Justice (DOJ) to keep tabs on Associated Press reporters, and lies and manipulations at many levels in the State Department to cover up the Terrorist attack that took place at Benghazi.

As of today, 76% of Americans, and 63% of Democrats, want the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate the targeting of conservative groups by the IRS.

Obama teaching Alinsky tactics

It is not surprising to note, in the light of these shocking abuses of power by the Obama administration, that Barack Obama taught Alinksy tactics in Chicago.

The Obama administration, if guilty of governing through the abuse of power and use of intimidation, will be guilty of a scandal that dwarfs President Nixon’s Watergate scandal, which occurred almost exactly 40 years ago .

 State and City Level

A previous summary of the underhanded tactics used by Democrats and by Unions in Wisconsin in 2011-2012 can be found in the article entitled Circus Madison Goes On.., written two years ago in August 2011 to document the unscrupulous goings on in my home town, yet still one of my most popular articles today.

Shooting at the Opposition

Apparently, despite all their anti-gun rhetoric, many “progressives” today, including the present leadership of the Democrat party, advocate “taking out” their opposition by any means available, ethical or unethical, legal or illegal.  Whenever their opponents do something right, progressive radicals get out their big guns!

Whenever conservatives begin to gain the edge, the Obama administration sends out the State Department, Department of Justice and the IRS, Hollywood gets out it’s progressive programming, the Freedom From Religion Foundation gets out their frivolous lawsuits, and intimidation begins, even at small potatoes like me.

Hey, Now They’re Shooting at Me!

If Charlie’s observation is correct, that “If They’re Shooting at You, You Know You’re Doing Something Right!,”then I should be glowing with pride.  I must be doing something right.

My SyteReitz.com website weathered a Denial of Service Attack (DoS) attack just before Memorial Day, a somewhat sophisticated and highly illegal form of cyber attack usually reserved for high-profile organizations such as banking, commerce, and media companies, or government and trade organizations. DoS attacks constitute a serious federal crime in the US, the United Kingdom, and in many other countries.  Violators can be sentenced to prison for up to 10 years.  Somebody must want to shut me down pretty badly, if they are risking 10 years in prison!

Not to worry, my web-guru/guardian angel/son who is also my hosting company, detected, defused and dispatched the offending miscreants, who were hijacking computers as far away as Germany to aim their futile dirty work at my site.

BTW, anybody in need of some outstanding web development and services would do well to check out ReitzInternet.com.

So Who’s Shooting at Me?

So who could be trying to shut down my website’s message?

Investigation has just started, but a search for suspects would logically start with opponents of the most popular blog posts.

This month’s web stats show surprisingly heavy traffic to some older articles, still very apropos today.
At the top of the list:

• Circus Madison Goes On… which documented the radical Circus that occurred in Madison in 2011-2012 during the Madison Capitol occupation by union demonstrators, and the ensuing political battles culminating in the unsuccessful recall attempt on Governor Walker.
• The Presumptive Nominee, or the Secret Insurrection, which argued before the 2012 election that the choice of Romney was foolish, and that a more conservative nominee would have stood a much better chance of defeating Obama in the election.
• The Update on the Catholic Child Abuse Scandals, which documented the fact that Catholic priests are selectively targeted by the media when in fact they are the lowest frequency group of offenders in all of society.
• Freedom From Religion Contracting Leprosy and Dissolving in Shame?or A Double Standard, in which a FindLaw.com article is described, which accuses the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF)  of being “hell-bent on attacking Christians.” (SyteReitz.com has been defending the Catholic Church from attack by the FFRF since January of 2011, when FFRF publicly opposed the rebuilding of a Catholic student center at the University of Wisconsin in Madison.)
• Abortion- a Much Bigger Deal Than You Think – in which the the hidden agenda and the repercussions of liberal abortion policy are discussed.

Not Worried Here

So the radicals are shooting at us; we must be doing something right.
We don’t shoot; we pray.

Defying God on Stage and in Real Life- and Falling into Traps

Ironically, West Wing featured an episode in which liberal President Bartlet cursed God out in Latin in the cathedral, purposely lighting a cigarette and stomping it out on the cathedral floor in derision.
This reflects a disrespectful attitude toward God that is prevalent among progressives today, and which is very apparent in today’s Obama administration’s disregard for life, for truth, and for religious liberty.

In West Wing, President Bartlet was played by actor Martin Sheen, father of Charlie Sheen. In real life, actor Martin Sheen considers himself a Catholic, despite his continuous support of Democratic pro-choice politicians and his support of same-sex marriage.  His son Charlie Sheen is best known for his role in the morally shocking TV serial Two and a Half Men, and for his substance abuse, felony menacing, third-degree assault and criminal mischief charges that have put him in the news.  Two and a Half Men portrays a hedonistic and dysfunctional household which includes an adolescent boy challenged by his parents’ divorce and witnessing the promiscuous lifestyle of his uncle daily. Aside from the potential influence of such a program on our entire culture, one has to wonder at the involvement of a child actor in such a plot.
The Sheen family, sadly, is living the agony of those who fall for the traps.

Back to Reality – The Obama Administration

We now watch the drama unfold, as the Obama administration, having set so many traps for so many, is starting to step into it’s own traps.

Ironically, ABC news just referred to Obama’s recent scandals as the “Scandal Trident,” writing that “There were developments today on each spear of the scandal trident currently bearing down on the West Wing.”  Wonder what inspired Byron Wolf of ABC to use the trident analogy?  The trident is known as a symbol of Satan. And Satan has no love for humans beings, not even for those who have fallen for his bait. So the mental image presented by secular (non-religious) ABC, of a trident bearing down on the West Wing of the White House, is a very interesting one, indeed.

My guess is that President Obama may soon be squirming and suffering.  We take no pleasure in that, other than the hope that America will see the error of “progressive ways” (Alinsky’s book was dedicated to Lucifer, or Satan), and will return to conservative and ethical government as codified in the Constitution of the United States, which is based on Judeo-Christian values and on the Ten Commandments.

 Cardinal Dolan for President!

or

Is the Republican Primary Over Yet?

The Presidential Race So Far

Mitt Romney - Barack Obama

Recent Gallup polls indicate a neck-in-neck competition between Mitt Romney and Barak Obama in the Presidential race.
Some are worried whether Romney will be able to beat President Barack Obama.
Others are worried whether Romney can be relied upon to repeal ObamaCare and refrain from issuing his own health mandates, if elected to the Presidency.

Solution?

Find someone more conservative and more popular than Mitt Romney!

Cardinal Timothy Dolan

Would anyone have guessed that according to the TIME Person of the Year Poll, Cardinal Dolan is way more popular than either Mitt Romney or Barack Obama?

Cardinal Dolan’s Popularity

Cardinal Dolan placed #16 globally in the TIME Person of the Year Poll, and about #4 nationally.
Cardinal Dolan got almost twice as many votes as Barack Obama, and about 6-fold more votes than Mitt Romney.

More famous people who were less popular than Cardinal Dolan:

• Lady Gaga
• Governor Jan Brewer of Arizona
• Steven Colbert
• Hillary Clinton
• George Cluny
• Sandra Fluke
• Michelle Obama
• Queen Elizabeth II
• Rick Santorum
• Newt Gingrich

Is Anybody in the U.S. More Popular than Cardinal Dolan?

Ron Paul

The only presidential candidate more popular than Cardinal Dolan was Ron Paul.
The only American more popular than both Ron Paul and Cardinal Dolan was Jeremy Lin, a famous baseball player.

Who Else Beat Out Ron Paul and Cardinal Dolan in Popularity?

Not too many people beat Ron Paul and Cardinal Dolan.

Anonymous Recruiting Ad: "Legion"

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Among those who did globally, were Vladimir Putin and the hackers called Anonymous, reputed to have hacked into the Vatican (and many other national websites).  Of course, in the case of Anonymous, there is the suspicion that they were not voted into #1 position globally, but could have hacked themselves into that position. 🙂

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Impact on the Republican Primary

Whether these results could impact the Republican Primary, or simply be a reflection of national opinion which can impact the Republican Primary,  is a matter for speculation.

Clearly, neither I, nor anyone else, including Cardinal Dolan, are seriously considering Cardinal Dolan for President.  But this popularity poll is interesting in the light of my previous articles on President Obama and President of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Cardinal Dolan.  They have butted heads in an important religious freedom confrontation, and it’s interesting to see which President is so much more popular with Americans.

But back to serious consideration of the Republican Primary.

Most believe that the Republican Primary is all but over.
Some cling tenaciously to alternative possibilities.  These include a Ron Paul, whom many consider to be an ineffective eccentric.

Now, Ron Paul’s ability to top so many national figures in the TIME Person of the Year Poll indicates we should take him much more seriously than we have in the past.  He has beat Cardinal Dolan, Barack Obama, Lady GaGa, Steven Colbert, Hillary Clinton, Queen Elizabeth II, Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich.

Could Ron Paul be the next giant political surprise?

Is the Republican Primary Over?

The Republican Primary is Not Yet Over!

There’s already been some discussion of whether the Republican Primary is over yet.
In the light of this TIME poll, and taking into consideration that politics is complicated and is often filled with unexpected surprises and results (like Hillary Clinton’s defeat in 2008 by Barack Obama), in the light of these facts, we better keep an eye on Ron Paul, the pro-life doctor who has delivered over 4,000 babies and now wants to be our President.

Ron Paul shows no signs of giving up.  He is actually making great strides towards taking over state Republican parties and delgations to the Republican National Convention.  His campaign shows no sign of giving up. As of last weekend, Ron Paul has locked up at least half the delegates in at least 3 states (Iowa, Minnesota & Washington).  He only needs the majority of delegates in 2 more states (like North Dakota and Maine) in coming weeks to be entered officially in the nomination at the Convention at Tampa, FL.

Romney, with only 847 if the 1144 delegates needed for the nomination (74%), will still have to contend with Ron Paul for quite some time.

Full Results of the TIME poll:

Four Years Ago: Hillary, Like Romney, Was the Presumed Candidate

or

Where is This Election Headed?

Hillary for President

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April 22, 2008:

In April of 2008, Hillary and Barak were neck-in-neck.  Hillary won the Pennsylvania Primary.  Then the Clinton campaign raised another $10 million.
Hillary and Barak continued to battle it out, about 1 percentage point apart, as they had been throughout the primary campaign. Hillary had been the presumed nominee for quite some time before the primary, and many believed that she could not lose.

Obama was giving her a run for her money and edging her out, but only by about 1%, and neither Hillary nor supporters were ready to concede.  The race was close. Estimated Delegate Score Card over time can be found here.
The media was not talking about the primary “dragging out,” or about any need to “coalesce behind one candidate” yet.

The battle continued until  Obama had enough delegates to win the primary, and he only won by a very slim margin.  Hillary only conceded on June 7, 2008, 4 days after Barak secured enough delegates to claim the nomination on June 3, 2008.

Who is Leading the Republican Primary Race Today?

Short Answer: Depends on who’s counting and depends on how you classify the votes.

Who’s Counting?
If the mainstream media and the Republican establishment are counting (Romney supporters), Romney is the leading candidate.  If Conservatives,Tea Party, and evangelicals are counting, the race is way too young to call.  50-60% of the delegates have not yet been assigned, and anything could happen.  It’s much too early to tell.

Mitt Romney vs Conservatives Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich, and Ron Paul

How Do You Classify the Votes?
If all four candidates attract a random segment of the American vote, and Santorum’s recent bowing out spreads the votes evenly among all candidates, then Romney is winning.
But if Conservatives are wedded to voting for conservatives like Santorum/Gingrich/Paul, and moderates are voting for Romney, then the exit of one conservative candidate will swing all the conservative votes to the next conservative candidate, and not to Romney.  That is certainly the case with my vote: in the first place, my vote goes to Santorum.  Failing that, to Gingrich.  Failing that to Paul.  Finally, failing that, to Romney. By this argument (see chart below), Romney has only 23-25% of the vote so far, and the Conservatives have 16-26% of the vote.  Again, way too early to call.  Conservatives and Romney neck-in-neck, and we have not even heard from 49-61% of America yet!

Uncertainty in the Delegate Counts

The Media has been very quick to assign delegates which are in any way uncertain, uncommitted or disputed, to Romney.  Why? That will be discussed later below.  Those mainstream media counts can be found at Wikipedia.
Conservative counts, on the other hand are made by more stringent criteria.  The Santorum campaign count, for example, shows remarkably different numbers.

The bottom line is, however, that with 49 to 61% of the delegates still unassigned, and with conservative states like Texas (155 delegates available with winner-takes-all) still in the offing, the race if far from over, unless the media (and the Republican establishment) manages to convince everyone that the race is over before it really is.

Here is the range of numbers claimed by various sources, depending on your source of delegate counts and assignment of contested delegates:

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Bottom Line Today:

Conservatives could be leading Romney by a much larger margin than Barak had on Hillary in 2008.

Lessons for us from 2008’s Democrat Primary

Why are some conservatives giving up?
Do they believe the media already?
Do they want to let the Republican establishment to steer the nomination, instead of the voters steering it?
It’s still early, and the race is far from over.
It’s not over until the fat lady sings (me).  🙂

Stay in there, Rick/Newt/Ron!

A conservative coalition (if you go by Rick Santorum’s numbers) is leading with a slight edge against Romney so far, just as Barak was leading against Hillary in April 2008.
If you guys stay in there, you can prevent Romney from getting the 1144 delegates he needs for the nomination. BTW, Rick’s suspended campaign could also be un-suspended at a later date.

Then, when nobody has the required 1144 delegates, the process starts again at the brokered convention.  As the candidates with least delegates are eliminated, it will boil down to one conservative against Romney, and that conservative will have a great chance of defeating Romney. America is ready for a real change.

The delegate counts so far tell us that Americans are definitely waffling on Romney; they prefer a true conservative. Tea Party candidates, evangelicals, and many other conservatives are nervous about Romney’s liberal past and the reliability of his new found conservative “conversion.”
We’ve just had a taste of somebody who promises one thing but delivers quite another- Obama.
Not to say that Romney’s recent commitments to conservatism are not appreciated or are not genuine.
We’re just a bit nervous about how reliable Romney’s recent “conversion” to conservatism is, given his past.

Time to Put America Ahead of Personal Success

Rick/Newt/Ron should team up to stay in the race for the sole purpose of preventing Romney from acquiring the 1144 delegates he needs for nomination.  In 1920, there was a brokered convention where the previous underdog candidate eventually won. There would still be hope of putting a true conservative in the White House.  Even if a particular candidate is not that person, they will have contributed to the restoration of our great nation by contributing to the election of another conservative.

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What Have You Got Against Mitt Romney?

Well, up front let us say that if Mitt Romney is nominated, we should all back him, campaign for him, and elect him as President of the United States.
Why? Because he has stated that he will oppose federal funding of abortion, that he will repeal ObamaCare, and that he will promote fiscal responsibility and limited government.  As opposed to Obama, who has stated (and done) the complete opposite.

But given Mitt Ronmey’s past positions, I’m just a bit nervous about how reliable Romney’s recent “conversion” to conservatism is.  In my mind, the Presidency should be given to someone we are very sure of.  More discussion of Romney at Committment to Truth; Romney vs Santorum.

Why mention “social issues” before “economic issues?”

“Social issues” (morality) come before economic issues because common sense and wisdom tell us what God already knows: that social issues drive the economics of a nation, and are the springboard from which a stable economy develops.  If you kill all your future citizens, your economy will not prosper.  If you overspend on an inefficient blundering health care system which provides free abortion, contraception and sterilization, your economy will take a blow. If you deny citizens freedom of conscience, sweeping Catholic hospital closings may result.  “Social issues” are the first domino with the power to take the entire economy down.

Judeo-Christian morality, on which conservatism and the Constitution of the United States are based, is a success manual given to us by a loving God, which provides the wisdom needed to avoid pitfalls both personal and national.

Why Would the Media or the Republican Establishment Want to Steer Us Towards Romney?

It’s pretty clear that Romney is much less conservative than the other Republican options.  He has supported abortion in the past, as well as supported socialized medicine, which became a template for ObamaCare.  Of course, the liberal media, as well as the liberal billionaires who fund the liberal media, would prefer Romney to the more conservative candidates, just in case Obama loses.  Hard to imagine that billionaires like George Soros, who make a hobby of attempting to steer global values with their accumulated billions, would not at least cover their bets partially in both parties, Democrat and Republican.

As for the Republican establishment, there are some who are comfortably entrenched in the less-than-perfect Republican establishment and who fear the effect that too much change and too many cuts may have on their comfort.  There are also those who fail to realize that the dynamics have changed in this election, that so many people are so much more committed and  involved in this election. That a giant has awoken.  They fear that they will lose voters in the middle if they offer a strong and  principled candidate who has demonstrated a reliable track record of conservatism.

Where are We Headed?

Time, and American voters, particularly today in the pirmaries, will determine where we are headed.
It is my hope that we still have a chance to elect a conservative to defeat Obama at the end of the day.
If not, my efforts will shift to praying for Romney’s strength and his commitment to the Judeo-Christian values on which this nation was founded. Romney has not been vetted or even questioned on his support of Judeo-Christian values. See Committment to Truth; Romney vs Santorum .

If voters have already jumped on board with Mitt Romney tonight, it will be a (premature) victory for the media and for the Republican establishment.  It will be a sad moment for those true conservatives who had hoped to return to the important “social issues” which determine the success of everything else.

May God bless and guide America!
May God bless and guide the Republican Primary winner!

Calling the shots

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Fortune cookie:

This is your day to call the shots, so you should.

O.K., if I had an ounce of self-restraint left before the Wisconsin primary coming up this Tuesday, this fortune cookie just eliminated it.
I’m going to call the shots.
What shots would I like to call today?
The 2012 Presidential election, of course.
Something I have little control over, so the results are bound to be amusing.

Calling the Shots

If you call the shots, you are in charge and you tell people what to do.
But calling the shots can also mean using a psychological trick: you “call the shot” in advance, forecasting a result, hoping to influence people’s choices, so that you encourage your favored result.

Calling the Shots in Advance

And that seems to be what the Republican Party is doing right now- calling the shots in advance.
The Republican establishment probably never planned that Mitt Romney would get serious competition from any of his running mates, and now that he’s getting some serious competition from Rick Santorum, they are scrambling to discourage that.  They are bringing out the big guns, party leaders who are endorsing Mitt Romney prematurely, when Mitt has only 565 of the necessary 1144 delegates to win the primary.

Republicans have not bargained on an awakening of the American people, a scenario in which politicians on BOTH sides of the aisle would have to become more responsive to their electorates (and responsive to Tea Party supporters) than they previously had been.  It’s a lot easier to sit in comfy chairs making small polite concessions to opponents followed by socializing after work, than to implement the big changes and make the big cuts that many Americans want in 2012, and which will cut some of the frills in Washington, too.

So many Republicans are rallying behind Mitt Romney prematurely, hoping to discourage Rick Santorum, and hoping that Rick Santorum will concede and quit.  This would avoid a long, drawn-out primary, followed by a “brokered” or “contested” convention, during which the Republican establishment will have less control over the results, and the American people will have more control over the results.

Election 2008

Calling the shots in advance did not work so well 4 years ago, when everybody was forecasting that Hillary Clinton would be the nominee. Obama was a nobody.  Yet we have President Nobody issuing mandates today, and the Supreme Court struggling to read the 2700 pages of his NobodyCares for ObamaCare. Calling the Shots in advance backfired on the Democrats in 2008.

Election 1920

President Harding

Then there was President Harding in 1920, who was a nobody with only 20% of the candidates compared with his opponent (General Leonard Wood) in the primary.  If anybody were calling the shots in advance back then, he would have lost the primary.  But what happened?  Nobody won the initial race,  and they went to a contested or brokered convention, where Harding got 70% of the votes and became President.

Election 2012

Now, for the first time since 1920, we could be heading for a contested or brokered convention again. Although Mitt Romney unquestionably has the most delegates at this time, it is not clear whether Romney will be able to reach the 1144 required to win.

1144 out of 2286 total delegates are needed to win; Romney has 565; Santorum has 256; Gingrich has 141; Paul has 66, and thus 1258 delegates are still up for grabs.  In other words, any candidate, including one starting with zero delegates today, could still be the winner.

Top Republicans are panicking and calling for an end to the primary battle, uniting behind Romney.

Newt Gingrich has slowed down his campaign, planning to sit out the fight between Romney and Santorum, then join back in for the contested convention.

Rick Santorum vows to stay in the race, even if he does not win Wisconsin this Tuesday.

My Call

Everybody wants to forecast events before they occur.  I will join them.

Gallup Polls

• Santorum is rapidly gaining on Romney:   Gallup Polls indicate that Romney and Santorum are competing closely, and are alternating in the lead during the last two months.

• Santorum plans to stay in the election.  So, there could well be a brokered convention.

• Santorum is a true conservative. Tea party likes him.  Evangelicals like him.

• Gallup also says that most Americans are conservative:  40% conservative, 35% moderate, and only 21% liberal.   Conservatives Remain the Largest Ideological Group in U.S.

• Romney is a question mark.  Romney has a shifting record that does not guarantee his sticking to promises any better than Obama has done. He takes direction well and changes direction well.  He would be better than Obama, but not better than Santorum.

• Even Gingrich is expecting a brokered convention; in fact, he is counting on it, while he takes a breather.

Put it all together, and I say:

• There will be a brokered convention.  Romney will not get 1144 delegates.  Santorum will not quit the primary.

• At the brokered convention, people will choose what they want: a conservative, Rick Santorum.

• The Republican establishment will have to make a correction to accommodate the Tea Party: less frills for everyone in Washington.

• Santorum will decimate Obama in the November election.  Even moderates have stopped liking Obama; he has simply gone
  

  Rick Santorum

  too far for everyone. D’Souza has branded Obama as an anti-colonialist whose goal is to readjust America’s standing in the world – not in a positive direction.  When the movie 2016 comes out this summer, Obama’s presidency will be over.

• We will all celebrate the fact that our system of government did in fact protect the people of the United States as the Founding Fathers designed it to do.

Vote for Rick Santorum for President!

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And if I’m Wrong?

If I am wrong, Mitt Romney will be the Republican nominee.

If he beats Obama, since trying to prove why he is different from Obama on central issues like ObamaCare and Abortion will not be easy, he will do one of two things:

Fulfill all the promises he made during the election, unlike his predecessor Obama.

or

Change his mind and continue Obama’s policies, or something akin to them.

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Abortion- a Much Bigger Deal Than You Think!

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Taking Life and Death Out of the Hands of Providence and Placing them into the Hands of Human Beings Paves the Way for Tyranny

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Why Democrats Should Rethink Abortion

Background

January 22, 2012 marked 39 years since Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court decision which legalized abortion in the United States (1973).

For 39 years, we have been terminating pregnancies clandestinely, most of us giving little thought to the ethics, economic implications, medical dangers, psychological effects, or any other aspect of abortion.

Media does not discuss abortion.  Friends and relatives rarely mention abortion.  Yet one third of all children conceived since 1973 in the US (54 million of them) have been aborted.  That means that 15% of our population is missing, and that one out of every 7 people is missing.  And, if you consider that they would also have had  some children, the number missing is even greater.  Many of us may be missing brothers and sisters about whom we know nothing.  Scores of women we know have aborted children, and most of us know nothing about it.

Purpose

The present article reviews the enormity of abortion, its effects on our entire society, and the exploitation of whole populations by modern politicians, who appear to be motivated by the same quest for power and gain as famous historical tyrants.

Questions

The central questions:

Is abortion right or wrong?
Is abortion a big deal?
How much is 52 million?
Do most Americans favor abortion?
Are women who have had abortions better off?
Why do most women avoid discussing their abortions?
Is a fetus a dispensable blob of tissue (see photo above), or is it a human being with a right to life guaranteed by the US Constitution?
Have we done anything to imbalance our society and our economy with all of this abortion?
What are the major motivations of abortion proponents?
continue reading…

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What is Truth?

Does Truth Matter?

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Scala Sancta, the Holy Steps

The Scala Sancta (the Holy Steps)

Last Saturday I had the incredible privilege of climbing the Scala Sancta in Rome reverently on my knees, and of standing near the place Christ must have stood when Pontius Pilate first asked Christ “What is truth?,”[1] then solemnly declined to condemn Him, ceremonially washing his hands of guilt[2].

Feeling that same floor under my feet, kneeling on those steps where the Passion of Christ occurred, and contemplating how St. Helena, the mother of the Emperor Constantine, located Pontius Pilate’s Praetorium steps and transferred them from Jerusalem to Rome, I was filled with an even deeper sense of connection to the reality of our Christian beliefs, and of the importance of acknowledging the conversation that took place on those steps, located now at one of the holiest places in the world.  “Non est in toto sanctior orbe locus;” There is not in the whole world a more holy place.

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Truth

What is Truth?

Truth does exist, truth does matter, and even our world’s great secular leaders, including Pontius Pilate, Socrates, Plato and Aristotle, instinctively cared about and respected truth, not to mention every parent who instinctively insists on truth from their children.  Christ willingly DIED for truth, because truth is so important.

Truth is most often defined as the state of being in accord with fact or reality.  It is clear to most of us that humans, while young, must learn certain facts or realities about life in order to negotiate the world safely and effectively, and in order to become functional adults who are responsible for the perpetuation of our society. continue reading…

Clashes between Liberals and Conservatives – Washington, United Nations, Madison — Common denominator?

Dirty tactics in Washington

A group of Washington liberals apparently decided that the recent government stalemate on spending was entirely Republican Speaker Boehner’s fault, despite the fact that President Obama and his Democratic House and Senate failed to schedule and pass the budget in a timely manner last year before the November 2010 election. Not one or two, but over 8,700 of these liberals recently committed to a Facebook campaign to dump their trash outside Speaker John Boehner’s residence today, because a government shutdown (from failure to pass the budget) would have halted trash collection in Washington. When a compromise was reached late last night on Federal budget issues, preventing the looming government shutdown, the Facebook group claimed victory, cancelled the trash-dumping while ridiculing Speaker Boehner:

Liberal facebook campaign

“Moments ago, a very orange Speaker of the House just announced that he caved into some of our demands. This is Victory Accomplished.”

Trash dumping is illegal. Ridicule of elected officials is unprofessional. Speaker Boehner represents the majority of Americans who voted in an election.  The use of such bullying tactics in a democracy is unacceptable and uncivilized.

Dirty tactics at the United Nations

The United States State Department, headed by Secretary of State Hillary

Cllinton addresses Human Rights Coucil Feb 28, 2011

Clinton, has recently been misrepresenting the Catholic Church’s position on a sexual orientation declaration, in a effort to win votes for this resolution:

The officials (of the U.S. State Department) purposely misled Latin American delegations into believing the Holy See (Catholic Church) had changed its position on a sexual orientation declaration that called for “sexual orientation and gender identity” to be new categories of non-discrimination in international law… The Holy See, in fact, opposed the declaration…

– National Catholic Register

The US Department of State (headed by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton) is telling Latin American delegations to the United Nations that the Vatican has changed its position on a sexual orientation declaration that was just released at the Human Rights Council in Geneva.

-Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute

The practice of such duplicity by United State officials at the United Nations is more than shocking.

Due to silence on these issues by the liberal media, few people know of United States efforts (headed by Hillary Clinton) toward the global spread of abortion rights and redefinition of marriage.

The fact that the U.S. State Department has been so emboldened now as to LIE about the Catholic Church’s position on these moral issues (in order to garner votes for this global liberal agenda), is very disturbing.

Latest dirty tactics in Madison

The latest development in Madison’s struggle between taxpayers and unions has involved the use of slander by liberals to influence Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice elections – an attempt to radicalize the composition of the Supreme Court, which will soon be making decisions on Governor Walker’s budget and collective bargaining law.

Toward this end, there was an outpouring of national union funds for defeating (and slandering ) Wisconsin’s conservative incumbent Supreme Court Justice Prosser.

Slanderous ad attempting to smear Jutsice Prosser

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Democrat ads falsely accused  Prosser of injustice in the handling of a 35 year old Catholic Church sex scandal case – a double punch to conservatives and to the Catholic Church( If You’re Looking for Child Abuse, the Catholic Church is the Last Place to Look).

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JoAnne Kloppenburg

Despite protests by the sex scandal victim and his demands that JoAnne Kloppenburg (the liberal candidate challenging Justice Prosser) pull the slanderous advertisements,  the untrue and malicious ads were not pulled. JoAnne Kloppenburg claimed that the ads were not run by her, but by a third party, and that she did not wish to deprive them of their “freedom of speech.”

Justice Prosser

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Clearly a display of unethical behavior and a poor choice by a candidate who might have served on the Wisconsin Supreme Court for the next 10 years!  Fortunately, as of this writing it appears that she is no longer a contender .

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I have survived a nuclear firestorm of criticism and attack and smear” –Justice Prosser

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History of dirty tactics in Madison

Being driven to political activism has been a real eye-opening experience for me—occurring, as it has, in Madison, WI, where I have been living for 22 years.

Reeling in disbelief at the recent below-the-belt political tactics exercised by the left, and mystified by the escalating frequency of illegal and quite frankly uncivilized behavior of previously respected elected officials and “teacher” demonstrators, I embarked on some research into liberal tactics.  The name of Saul Alinksy began to surface—the author of a new disgusting form of “activism” which is in direct conflict with Judeo-Christian values and which specializes in undermining democratic rule, for use by radicals who want to force change against the will of a majority.

It was easy for me, as well as for many Americans, to steer clear of political involvement previously, under the pressures of career, child-rearing and (for me) home-schooling, particularly while practicing the forbearance we were taught as a good Christians —assuming the best possible about others; treating them as you would be treated; assuming they are doing the same to you.

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Bad assumptions, as it turns out, in Madison, Wisconsin, USA in 2011.

SO bad, that I marvel at and have started blogging about the discontinuity between media reports and actual reality in the recently publicized budget struggles between Governor Walker and union leadership in Madison Wisconsin (A Word from the Silent Majority; What’s Really Happening in Wisconsin; What is REALLY going on in Wisconsin).  My blogging is the product of my frustration and indignation in watching the discontinuity between reality and left-leaning “progressive” media reports.

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Fred Risser, the senior Democrat member of the Wisconsin Legislature

While unions (which historically have done much good work), and the Democrats who represent them, now break laws, slander, malign, misrepresent, and conspire to stall the democratic process, and while the Madison police who support them fail to enforce the law, while the Mayor of the City of Madison assists liberals in stalling the progress of the State Legislature’s work, and while liberal judges overlook State law (also helping unions to stall impending budget legislation), the media, and much of liberal Madison, continue to applaud and idolize all these agents who are actually impeding the fair implementation of democracy (A Word from the Silent Majority; What’s Really Happening in Wisconsin; What is REALLY going on in Wisconsin).

Dirty tactics appear systematic, not isolated

The tactics being used in Madison today (unreported by most media) are shocking even to someone like me, hardly an “innocent,” who grew up in New York City, commuting to high school daily on New York City subways, and attending the State University of New York at Stony Brook in the 1960’s and 70’s, at the height of student unrest in the Vietnam protest era.

Research on these tactics led me to findings that would surprise most Americans who value Judeo-Christian ideals (that would be over 80% of us).

The apparent abandonment of political ethics and morality which we have been observing evidently is not a random, unplanned general degeneration of public standards that one might initially suspect.  There are actually methods and calculated political action being implemented (primarily by liberal radicals, although occasionally conservatives have been known to lash back with similar tactics).  These efforts are well organized, and have achieved much success in implementing radical agendas against the wishes of the majority in the United States.

Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals

As it turns out, these “new” radical methods stem from the radical philosophy of Saul Alinsky (author of Rules for Radicals ), and have been embraced and used quietly and surreptitiously by powerful individuals and organizations including Hillary Clinton, Barak Obama, the National Education Association (NEA), and the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO).

Saul Alinsky

Saul Alinsky (1909-1972) was an American “community organizer” and writer .  Born in Chicago to an orthodox Jewish family, his plans to become an archaeologist were disrupted by the depression.  Instead, he embarked on a career of political activism, organizing first for the labor movement, then in ghettos across the United States.

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Barack Obama, “community organizer”

Saul Alinksy’s radical methods for community reorganization (does this term sound familiar? Barak Obaman’s campaign credentials included being a “community organizer” in Chicago) were practiced by Alinsky since the Great Depression, were published in 1971, and have slowly been permeating the modus operandi of the unions, and of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) which represents them, since then.   Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals, outlining his beliefs and methods, can be distilled down to an “anything goes” or “ends justify ANY means” philosophy—a philosophy unhampered by truth, fairness or lawful behavior. A philosophy that scorns communication, compromise and the democratic process, while extolling the intentional generation of conflict toward the purpose of manipulation through fear:

Alinsky was a bluff iconoclast who concluded that electoral politics offered few solutions to the have-nots marooned in working-class slums. His approach to social justice relied on generating conflict to mobilize the dispossessed. Power flowed up, he said, and neighborhood leaders who could generate outside pressure on the system were more likely to produce effective change than the lofty lever-pullers operating on the inside.—Peter Slevin, Washington Post

In his book Rules for Radicals, Alinsky himself writes:

“What follows is for those who want to change the world from what it is to what they believe it should be. The Prince was written by Machiavelli for the Haves on how to hold power. Rules for Radicals is written for the Have-Nots on how to take it away.”

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Alinsky’s influence

Alinsky’s “community reorganization” methods have been a common ideological touchstone for Hillary Clinton and Barak Obama.  Hillary Clinton wrote her senior honors thesis at Wellesley College on Saul Alinksky, and was offered a job by Alinsky in 1968.  Following Alinsky’s death, Barak Obama was hired by Alinsky’s followers to organize black residents on the South Side of Chicago, while learning and applying Alinsky’s philosophy of street-level democracy.

Teacher’s groups like the National Education Association (NEA) used Saul Alinsky as a consultant to train their own staff, and unions like the AFL-CIO acknowledge their roots in Saul

Alinsky–inspired community organization , and list Alinsky’s “Rules for Radicals” on their web page under training for shop stewards .

Radical liberals who embrace Alinsky’s philosophy and tactics are well aware of the unpopularity of such tactics with 80% of (Christian) Americans, and they are not in a big rush to acknowledge, name or publicize their techniques.

What ARE Alinksy’s rules?

Alinsky’s book, Rules for Radicals, is prefaced by an acknowledgement to Lucifer, the “very first” radical:

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Lucifer

Lest we forget at least an over-the-shoulder acknowledgement to the very first radical: from all our legends, mythology, and history ( and who is to know where mythology leaves off and history begins—or which is which), the first radical known to man who rebelled against the establishment and did it so effectively that he at least won his own kingdom – Lucifer.

– Saul Alinsky

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Alinsky’s rulesinclude:

• “Wherever possible go outside the experience of the enemy. Here you want to cause confusion, fear and retreat.”
• “Make the enemy live up to his/her own book of rules. You can kill them with this. They can no more obey their own rules than the Christian church can live up to Christianity.”
• “Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon. It is almost impossible to counterattack ridicule. Also, it infuriates the opposition, who then react to your advantage.”
• “The threat is generally more terrifying than the thing itself.”
• “In a fight almost anything goes. It almost reaches the point where you stop to apologize if a chance blow lands above the belt.”
• “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it and polarize it.” (Use name-calling to damage your conservative opponents.  Demonize them.)
• “One of the criteria for picking the target is the target’s vulnerability … the other important point in the choosing of a target is that it must be a personification, not something general and abstract.” (For example, choose a conservative to demonize aggressively for political incorrectness, while applying much more lax and forgiving standards to your own radical colleagues.)
• “The enemy properly goaded and guided in his reaction will be your major strength.” For instance, Democrats imply conservatives are racists or that Republicans want to kill senior citizens by limiting the growth of the Medicare system, they imply Republicans want to deny kids lunch money without offering real proof. These red-herring tactics work.

The contrast between Radical rules and traditional Judeo-Christian rules

The Ten Commandments

.. . .. These Alinsky rules can be contrasted with the Judeo-Christian 10 Commandments, which are based on Exodus 20:2-17, and which form the springboard of the U.S. Constitution and of most conservative thinking:

A new set of rules has been introduced by radicals

It is beginning to look like a new philosophy is becoming prevalent in the political arena – the strictly utilitarian Alinsky philosophy, which defies Judeo-Christian morality and despises the exercise of egalitarian democracy.  It reflects a culture of selfish entitlement, by whatever means necessary to advance oneself and one’s friends.  It strives to preserve the illusion that there is a community participating in the decision-making process, while in actual fact the citizens and their opinions are being squeezed out.  This Alinsky philosophy has been adopted widely by numerous liberal groups, including teachers unions,  the DNC, and President Obama’s community organizing friends, including ACORN.

Much evidence is accumulating that Planned Parenthood operates using these tactics too. For example, it has successfully propagandized gullible Americans into believing that killing an unborn human is a “choice” that improves a woman’s “health,” when in actual fact abortion is associated with an increased chance of death in comparison with childbirth.  Even President Barack Obama uses this “progressive” jargon in reference to abortion, contrary to the beliefs of the majority in America.

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Saul Alinsky

Practioners of the Alinsky method welcome conflict, and use conflict to their own advantage, to circumvent the will of the majority.  Their method often goes unidentified, or lurks under many titles, but is rarely identified as the Alinsky method.  The method often adopts or transforms other techniques such as the “Delphi Technique,” creating spin-offs under different names.

ridicule

Until we responsible conservatives recognize this new breed of liberal, and develop our own plan of action for identifying and countering these opponents who despise and violate common sense rules of morality and the foundations of a healthy democracy, much ground will be lost.  While we spin our wheels, bewildered and incredulous, the Alinskiites are continuing to acquire power and to erode our freedoms.

What next?

Knowing the enemy is the principal step towards victory.

Ridicule is the radical liberal’s biggest tool.  Religion (Judeo-Christian values) is their biggest target.

This is a war of values, and we must guard ourselves carefully against the new barrage of lies with which responsible conservatives are being attacked.

Once we learn not to take their attacks personally, and once we realize that our opponents have no interest in honest negotiation, we can move forward with determination and with strength, which, incidentally, leaders like John Boehner and Scott Walker are doing for us.

We must support our conservative leaders with our votes, with our confidence, with our emails, with our words, and with our pocketbooks.

Related Article, 7/27/13: