I've been trying to tell you for a long time now that the TEA party movement has been co-opted by those who see it as a vehicle by which to weaken the republican party and in turn eliminate the effective check on an otherwise runaway progressive shift in this nation. If you read this blog, this should be no surprise:
A prominent Kentucky Tea Party leader [Wendy Caswell] who endorsed the Republican primary challenger to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is a registered Democrat who signed a pledge to support Democratic policies and principles while running for state representative in 2012.
While Caswell reportedly founded the Louisville Tea Party in 2009 and currently serves as its leader, public records raise questions about her political affiliations and recent intervention in the GOP primary.
Caswell is a registered Democrat, according to Kentucky State Board of Elections records. She ran as a Democrat in 2012 for state representative in the 42nd district, but lost the primary race.
“I, Wendy Caswell, do solemnly swear … that I am a registered Democrat voter in M121 precinct,” wrote Caswell in a handwritten Feb. 9, 2012 campaign filing, obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.
“I believe in the principles of the Democratic Party, and intend to support its principles and policies,” the pledge continued. [Free Beacon]
Well, you might say, not all of the TEA party folks are infiltrators and saboteurs, and you would be right, but take a look at what TEA party leader John Kemper has to say about this shocking revelation:
And of course since there has been a dedicated effort by some, including Judge Napolitano who spoke in Boone County last week, to use the TEA party as a way to advance the libertarian agenda of those like Ron Paul, look what Libertarian Ken Moellman had to say about the article which exposed Ms. Caswell as a devoted democrat:
Wendy Caswell is a truly committed activist? Well then, her sworn oath to support the Democrat party must be a really important expression of her loyalty and wouldn't her activism on its behalf be well served by supporting an opponent of the strongest republican leader in the nation, particularly if she could do it wearing the uniform of a "trusted conservative" ?
Again, I am certain that many people who are involved in the TEA party are very dedicated conservatives but they are being played by others. Their desire to make the GOP more conservative should inspire them to support the GOP and work within it, not against it.
I am very happy to have been recognized as the top Conservative website in Kentucky by the Washington Post and to have the growing number of readers which we enjoy.
With so many other sources of news out there, thank you for reading the BluegrassBulletin.
I would like for you to read a bit of a New York Times article in which Bill Keller suggests that something's happening here and what it is ain't exactly clear, but he has a suggestion. Take a look and tell me if his "eureka" moment isn't close to my observations from four years ago.
The right-wing campaign to sabotage the Affordable Care Act has driven a
lot of normally temperate people past the edge of exasperation.
But I have a notion: The Republicans are finally having their ’60s. Half
a century after the American left experienced its days of rage, its
repudiation of the political establishment, conservatives are having
their own political catharsis.
To those of us who lived through the actual ’60s, the conservative
sequel may seem more like an adolescent tantrum than a revolution.
Like the original ’60s, when revolutionary fervor coexisted with the
celebration of free love and pharmaceutical bliss, the new ’60s has a
growing libertarian flank. And just as the 1960s “movement” had its
share of camp followers who showed up for the sex, drugs and rock ’n’
roll, the Tea Party attracts political freeloaders drawn by the
addictive drugs of power and television attention.
I tried out my theory on Todd Gitlin, a Columbia professor whose books
include “The Sixties: Years of Hope, Days of Rage.” He pointed to one
important similarity between then and now, and one significant
divergence.
“The very strong parallel is the go-for-broke mood,” Gitlin said. The
rules of order and civility of language go out the window because “you
feel this is a matter of apocalyptic urgency.” Obamacare is not Vietnam,
“but for them it is.”
I've drawn similar analogies in various public speeches since the rise of the TEA party in 2010. There are many parallels and for a guy who studied and wrote papers and essays in the 1970's about the riots of 1968 and the Chicago seven trial, the analogies are very familiar to me.
Nice to see, once again, that my observations dawn on people even if it is much later. Just call me Nostradamus Jr.
At the end of this week I will have been publishing the
BluegrasBulletin for six years. When it
comes to other “blogs” I have seen them come, and seen them go. Over time this blog has not only survived,
but thrived.
I am honored to have been named the best conservative blog
in Kentucky for the past two years by the Washington Post. Our “uniques” (a geeky term for a reliable
measure of readership) is as they say “through the roof”.
I find that my analysis is repeated frequently on radio
shows, other news sites and blogs around the country.
More and more people from many disciplines, not just
politics, are feeding stories my way.
This blog is linked on many, many other blogs throughout the
world. And strangely enough, readership
in Europe and Russia, and Scandinavia and South America is growing.
All of what you find here is being done for free. Hours of research, hours of writing and
editing, days and days of tracking stories in order to piece together the most
insightful commentary I can construct has all been done for free.
Nobody is funding this effort. I have been doing it like a college player, “for
the love of the game”.
But six years ago this medium was fresh, it was cutting edge
and it had crazy potential. Today, even
though the old media is failing, new delivery systems are emerging and the
intellect and insightfulness of people has improved as a result.
Your ability to process information is faster, more accurate,
less dependent upon the “gravitas” of the source and far more dependent upon your
own ability to listen, look, analyze and eventually discern truth in the
message. Your mental acuity has
sharpened.
Oh sure, provocative sites can still seduce us to stare at
be-headings, watch fires consume innocent families and cause us to gloat as one
person or another weeps his or her way through a public apology after the
revelation of some shocking indiscretion.
But you are better than that.
Six years is a long time in this business. It’s a really long time for one guy to write
so many words, so many stories, cover so many events and do it all with no more
incentive than knowing that you are out there, reading, thinking about,
commenting upon and sharing the things you find here.
I turned another couple milestones this year. I turned sixty. We had our first grandchild.
I’m not sure yet, but I am beginning to sense an even
greater responsibility to peel back the mask, expose the story behind the story
and to take what I started six years ago this week to another level. As I do, I will need help. But our cause is just.
Will I succeed in adding to your knowledge base something of
value? Time will tell. But I can assure you of one thing.
In the end, knowing you are out there is all that it has
taken to keep me going thus far. I think
that’s enough.
There is a lot of confusion in political discussions concerning the transmittal of information from National Security contract employee Edward Snowden to the foreign press and the Chinese. And that is why it is so shameful that media hounds in Congress have exploited you to attract attention to themselves.
There are four issues involved in this controversy and it's time to have an adult conversation about them rather than allow yourself to fall victim to the inflammatory rhetoric of the ignorant and the egomaniacs. Here they are.
First is the question of whether the NSA is engaged in illegal or unconstitutional acts.
Second is the question of whether We The People want them to engage in those actions even if legal and constitutional.
Third is what should be our response to what Snowden did.
And fourth is the question of who we can trust with their hands on the reins of power.
1. IS THE NSA ENGAGED IN ILLEGAL OR UNCONSTITUTIONAL SPYING?
The facts of what the NSA is doing or planning to do are still coming out. And I'm sure that the information we have thus far has come from sources that have provided ample reason to distrust the answers we have. For example Justin Amash has called the Congressional testimony of the director of national security James Clapper "perjured". Clapper you will recall said that the government does not "wittingly" collect and store data on American citizens. We now know this is not true but that is not the end of the inquiry.
We have not only been told that the NSA does indeed collect and store data but that their actions are both legal and constitutional.
Of course media addicts in Congress immediately ran to the floor of the house, onto Twitter and Facebook and back to their constituents and claimed that American's civil liberties were under attack and that the actions of the NSA are violations of the Fourth Amendment.
Well, are they?
As I said, the facts are still developing, but what we now know they are doing may be well within the boundaries of the constitution.
For example, you surely know that what you share on Facebook, Tweet on Twitter, comment about on other websites or do in the social media world is not private. Of course neither is your list of friends, place of employment, where you vacation, live, what you read, what you 'like' private. As I've tried to warn people for years, even your Google searches are public.
When you use a search engine, a phone app or most other online programs you are subject to their terms of service and privacy. Most of the services which are free mine data about your likes, your interests and the products you buy and then they compile that data into demographics and sell all of that information to advertisers. Nobody should be shocked by this.
But what is most important for people to understand is that the areas of your life which are protected by the Fourth Amendment are only those areas which the Supreme Court has not yet declared to be outside your "expectation of privacy."
Did you know that police need no warrant to search your property so long as they stay outside of the "curtilege"? Courts have approved the placement of hidden cameras on your property without a warrant. Spying from overhead is okay under some circumstances and we should all by now have heard of how police can use drug sniffing dogs to effectively search the contents of your car, your home, your suitcase and even your mail.
When you place a letter in the mailbox there is no prohibition against someone logging all of the places from which and too which you send mail.
But when it comes to establishing a "pen register", that is tracking the phone numbers of all calls made, or the address and subject line of emails, other laws may be triggered which would require a probable cause warrant. The government's argument that no warrant is required is far from a new concept. The Wall Street Journal covered this topic over five years ago and it was debated quite thoroughly.
I have been warning you about these intrusions over and over for many years. (just go to my topics list and search under Web/Tech and Civil Liberty)
The legal question which needs to be answered is whether the NSA complied with the warrant requirements, whether a FISA warrant was enough or whether the data mining was in fact done illegally. Until we know more it is reckless to declare their actions unconstitutional.
2. LEGAL OR NOT DO WE WANT THE GOVERNMENT TO HAVE THE RIGHT TO SPY ON US?
Why this discussion is confusing is in part because the media hounds in politics want you to be confused. Rather than taking the measured approach to discussing if the acts are legal or not, they want to ratchet up the discussion and your emotions by urging that we DON'T want the government to have access to our phone records, whether they listen to the calls or not. Is that true?
I for one was against many of the provisions of the Patriot Act at a time when that was not a very popular position among my fellow Republicans. But that act was debated, passed, renewed and extended by Congress over the past eleven years and it is the law of the land.
But more specifically the question now isn't whether we are living in a world governed by the Patriot Act or not (we are) but whether we really want the government to have access to things like call patterns. Think about that for a minute.
Let's assume that the Feds bust a terrorist before he can act. They acquire his cell phone. Sure they could go back and look at all of his incoming and outgoing calls, but what if the database could also allow them to see that he has been calling a number frequently that has also shown up in another state that was being called frequently by another known terrorist? Might the entire cell be discovered? Might people who would otherwise not be on the radar be linked together? Might the DHS or the FBI or the CIA be able to make a stronger case against them and prevent a terrorist plot from being executed?
How would that ever take place unless call patterns of all phones were in the database to be searched, linked and investigated?
How about the same type information except it comes from emails, websites and URL's that could be linked? With millions of websites out there might one or two obscure ones be the meeting place or the educational source for terrorists? How would the information obtained from one captured terrorist be of any use unless patterns could be developed? And by the way, since Google, Yahoo and all the others mine and sell this data to advertisers, what would keep the government from accessing it anyway?
Maybe we need to have a debate over just how far we are willing to let the government go in spying on such things. It might be time to have an adult conversation about such things. But now is not the time to let the passions of the moment destroy our national security abilities without careful consideration.
I have not softened on the Patriot Act or my dedication to the Constitution. That's why I would prefer to tone down the rhetoric and have a reasoned discussion.
3. IS IT RIGHT TO CALL SNOWDEN A HERO?
It is not right to call Snowden, the NSA leaker, a hero or to call for him to be exempted from prosecution. Those who do are reckless and dangerous and untrustworthy.
He had a high security clearance, stole top secret documents and carried them to a foreign country where he is now working with the Chinese. If worrying about borrowing money from the Chinese is a concern, delivering top secret documents to them and openly disclosing that the USA is hacking their computers shouldn't earn a traitor immunity.
Snowden is probably lying about many things, including his level of authority within the national security ranks. But some in Congress like Thomas Massie say that he deserves no prosecution? Why? Because he told us that the NSA was doing precisely what they had already told us they were doing years ago? That's not only silly but proof that a little recent enthusiasm is no replacement for years of study and active participation.
4. WHO CAN/SHOULD WE TRUST?
Our founders were very clear. We were supposed to choose our elected officials from among the most trusted citizens. In the old days candidates did not campaign for themselves, it was beneath them. They did not lust for power, they considered their role as humble servants of the public trust.
But today people lust for power, prestige and a paycheck and so they jump up and claim to be the new leader, the new face the one who can lead us to the promised land. In too many cases, our president being one, we know little about these men and women.
Many times they do not come from our community experience. They have not proven their trustworthiness over time. They are not tested. There ideas not public knowledge, their world view scripted into a campaign instead of vetted by public discussion.
The problem isn't that we need no government, the problem is that we have no trust in the men and women who hold the power of government.
Do you know people who you would trust to watch your children, stay with your spouse, hold your wallet, live in your house without going through your drawers and cabinets, and computer files?
Unfortunately too many of the people we elect to office we would not want training our children, yet we let them run the Department of Education. We look the other way when they drive away from campaign events in the company of other women, their wives at home, and we are expected to ignore their philandering.
How many politicians need the job? What might they do in order to keep it? Would you trust them with your money? You do when you give them the power to tax you and take your money from you.
And now these same unvetted, untrustworthy people have access to our homes, our computer files and our financial records. Why?
The answer is simple. It is our fault. We have not been engaged enough. We have not been insistent enough. We have not gone out and recruited the best, most trustworthy people to run for office and then supported them.
Instead we have become the audience for a grand show under the big top. We are suckers. We fall for campaign trickery, we buy into the politics of personal destruction, we have become the audience clinging to the cage and cheering for defeat at Thunderdome.
The problem isn't that our great nation has developed the technology to protect us from our enemies. The problem is that we no longer trust those in whose hands we have placed that technology. And that is our fault, and we can fix it.
President Obama recently said something that came close to the truth, but I doubt that he saw the truth in it. He spoke to the graduating class at Ohio State and said this:
Unfortunately, you've grown up hearing voices that incessantly warn of
government as nothing more than some separate, sinister entity that's at
the root of all our problems. Some of these same voices also do their
best to gum up the works. They'll warn that tyranny always lurking just
around the corner. You should reject these voices. Because what they
suggest is that our brave, and creative, and unique experiment in
self-rule is somehow just a sham with which we can't be trusted.
We have never been a people who place all our faith in government to
solve our problems. We shouldn't want to. But we don't think the
government is the source of all our problems, either. Because we
understand that this democracy is ours. And as citizens, we understand
that it's not about what America can do for us, it's about what can be
done by us, together, through the hard and frustrating but absolutely
necessary work of self-government. And class of 2013, you have to be
involved in that process.
You are right Mr. President, we need to reject the voices that call our for the end of our form of government, the voices of the anti-government libertarians and the anarchists. You are right Mr. President that it is wrong for them to say that our brave and creative and unique experiment in self-rule is just a sham. But you are also right Mr. President that we no longer trust those who are now viewed as part of a sinister entity, our Congress, our Senate, many of our judiciary and those in your administration.
And you couldn't be more right Mr. President when you say that the work of self-government is hard, and frustrating but that it is absolutely necessary and that those in your audience at Ohio State and in mine here at the BluegrassBulletin have to be involved in that process.
We need to look around. We need to go back and be willing to admit that we made some bad choices and we have to be willing to look for better people, more trusted, tested and rational to hold the reins of power.
I think what you said to that class Mr. President as they graduated from college and headed out into the world, is that they are now adults and that it is now time for the adults to have a conversation about our future instead of the chicken-littles, the media hounds and those with a seething hatred for the institutions and traditions that make us the greatest nation in the history of the world.
POLITICO is reporting that an intensive study conducted by the next generation of republicans, The College Republican National Committee, due to be released today is a scathing account of how the GOP has lost young voters. Bottom line, the party is completely out of touch with the attitudes of youth.
Young voters apparently see the GOP's stance on gay marriage, immigration, social welfare programs and of course, abortion, as out of touch with their world view. In otherwords the survey suggests that in order for the GOP to win the youth vote it needs to jettison its platform and model itself after the Barack Obama liberal agenda.
Of course the attitudes of young people tend to change as they get older and it's hard for younger voters to tell a party run mostly by older Americans what to do. But you should read the report, and then realize that it is based upon "surveys of 800 registered voters each, ages 18-29, and six focus groups
of young people, including Hispanics, Asian-Americans, single women,
economically struggling men and aspiring entrepreneurs in Ohio, Florida
and California who had voted for President Barack Obama — he cleaned up
with 60 percent of the youth vote — but were considered “winnable” for
the GOP."
I agree that the GOP needs to make some changes, but the problem is more systemic than the youth survey suggests. Conservatives have ceded control over messaging to the left which means that the left can indoctrinate better because it controls Hollywood, music, news and the Internet delivery systems.
No wonder POLITICO's report ended with this observation:
“I would say what the report conveys is frustration,” Schriver said. “As
we sat in those six focus groups they would continually say they agree
with policies we know we hold, but they didn’t equate those policies
with the Republican Party. That’s really one of the biggest takeaways of
this document. … We need to do a better job communicating. It boils
down to dorm-room issues, how policies we are promoting are going to
affect young people today.”
How long have I been saying this? And I have a very viable solution if only some in the GOP would only let down their guard and listen.
Though many more people are reading this site on a daily basis than every before, what many of you may not realize is that I have been publishing this for what will soon be six years. And in that time I have warned you about many things which ultimately arrived, or things which are creeping closer.
For example, it was way back in August of 2007 that I first detected a stealth plan to disarm America. The article I linked to is no longer available but the concept I alerted you to is now very real. Here's what I said back then:
I identified a potential threat to lawful gun owners across
America a few years back that caused me great concern. The constitution
protects our right to bear arms, but what about access to ammunition?
Well, get ready.
A firearm without ammunition is a poor excuse for a hammer. There
are several ways to eliminate our ability to have effective guns. One
is to deplete the ammunition supply (read story)
and the second is to impose more stringent regulations on access to
ammunition, and/or the transportation, storing and ownership of
gunpowder as a "homeland security" measure. The second scenario
controls making ammo at home.
The NRA and GOA need to begin addressing these problems now. It's
one thing to protect the right to own a gun, but without ammo, who'd
care.
Well fast forward six years and here's today's news from California:
The California Senate today approved a package of bills that tighten
the state's regulation of firearms by outlawing detachable and large
capacity magazines, keeping track of people who buy ammunition and
widening the category of offenders who are prohibited from owning guns
for 10 years.
Senate Democrats drafted the bills in response to December's school shooting in Newtown, Conn.
"The package, if you look at the whole array of measures before this
body today, are designed to close loopholes in existing regulations,
keep the circulation of firearms and ammunition out of the hands of
dangerous persons, and strengthen education on gun ownership," Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg said to his colleagues as he argued in favor of the legislation.
"These bills attempt to respond to those well-publicized tragedies and many more that go unpublicized."
Republicans, who hold a minority in the state Senate, voted against
the bills, arguing that they would make it harder for law-abiding
citizens to access weapons, while doing little to combat crime. They
said mass shootings are caused by mental illness, not a lack of gun
regulations. [Sacramento Bee]
Can't find any ammo can you? Reloading supplies are in short supply too right? Micro-stamping and other bills are out there effectively disarming America without outlawing guns. And you think the time will never come when citizens will fear the government? How about when the government is armed and you are not?
"When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty." - Thomas Jefferson
ead
more here:
http://blogs.sacbee.com/capitolalertlatest/2013/05/ca-senate-approves-8-bills-to-regulate-guns.html#storylink=cpy
Stock prices are high. Why? The old model of buying stocks with the hope that the dividend returns would give you a better yield than bank deposits has long since gone out of style. We are back to the Clinton years game of buying stocks with the hope of selling them at a higher price, and dividends don't count.
But there is another reason why the stock market might be running so high. It might be the same reason that milk prices are running so high, why gasoline prices are running so high and why interest rates at banks are running so low. It's called "inflation".
Inflation is a term that describes the amount of printed money in circulation. When the money supply is artificially excessive due to government printing of money the bubble of money "inflates". That makes every dollar out there worth less, which means it takes more of them to buy food, gasoline and yes even stocks.
But Bernanke says there is nothing to worry about. Really?
I wouldn't say it's time to panic, but I would say it's time to use your money to buy the things you might really "need" in the future and avoid buying just the things you "want" right now. The day might come when the things you "need" cost more than you "have".
Right now the Fed is printing money to help keep banks open. Why? Because they don't have enough money on deposit to cover the loans they have out or the expenses they must pay to stay open. And why don't they have enough money on deposit? Because so many of their loans have gone into default and had to be written off.
So a lot of the money you put into their bank which they then lent to others, isn't ever coming back. And since banks are permitted to loan far more than they have on deposit (because they borrow money from other banks at one rate and loan it at a higher rate) eventually banks may begin to default on loans from other banks and a domino effect of collapse would take place.
The Fed is propping them up right now with printed money loaned at zero percent interest. And what happens when it all comes tumbling down? You won't have access to what you thought was in your account, because the bank will be boarded up and out of business.
But won't the FDIC insurance cover me? If you are first in line, maybe, but they don't have nearly enough money to cover all of the deposits so those farther back in line could lose everything.
"Well isn't this just like Cyprus?" Not according to Benny at the Bank.
Cyprus does not pose a threat to the U.S. economy or financial
system and there are no signs of stock market bubble, Fed Chairman Ben
Bernanke said on Tuesday.
The Fed chief told reporters that
the central bank was monitoring the situation in Cyprus. "At this point,
we're not seeing a major risk to the U.S. financial system or the U.S.
economy," he said.
Bernanke added, "The only way they'd create
a problem is if the runs become contagious in some sense and other
countries lost confidence." [CNBC]
I wonder what they were telling the people in Cyprus before the banks confiscated the people's money? What? There was no warning?
Yesterday I observed this about the changing landscape of the country, after noting Cathy Bailey's observations and the rise of the Libertarians:
"Is all this talk about the surge of the
Libertarians just the euphoric haze of the success of the Ron Paul
faction gathering a bit of press for itself? Probably. But as more and
more young people look for a place in politics the more "liberal" part
of being a libertarian might become much more appealing than the stodgy
old conservatism of the old guard GOP.
I kinda remember that feeling. It was
the climate of the country during the Nixon years. Only in those days
Nixon won, not McGovern. Now it looks like McGovernment is winning,
which is clearly the unintended consequence of the Libertarian movement."
The Romney team was so isolated deep inside this conservative media
bubble that they continued to believe victory was theirs well into the
evening.
That embarrassing political tale proved that
conservatives had finally become what they had once mocked: an insular
movement so lost in its own echo chamber that it rarely made contact
with those who didn’t share their world view. This is, of course, the
same trap that liberals fell into in Manhattan newsrooms and on college
campuses throughout the 1960s and 70s during the rise of Richard Nixon,
Ronald Reagan and the Silent Majority.
Middle-class Californians were so set on edge by the Watts riots and
Berkeley protests of 1965 that they elected an aging actor as
California’s governor in 1966.
Two years later, the radicalism of Chicago helped elect Richard Nixon
and set American liberalism back on its heels for a generation. [POLITICO]
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