Dated February 3, 2014: My Response to a Post on the Facebook Page "Draft Judge Andrew Napolitano for President"

The Question: Many folks in the GOP (Including the Establishment) are calling Obama Lawless...

The definition of lawless is not regulated by or based on law; not restrained or controlled by law : unruly; illegal.

If the President is indeed LAWLESS, doesn't Congress have a sworn duty to IMPEACH?

(Above: Judge Andrew Napolitano)

My Answered Reply:

Government is inherently lawless and will consistently conceive of its own code of ethical mores immune from its electorate. It begets corruption, and there is no good that can come of government except that without it, anarchy would be birthed and greater chaos ensued. President Obama and the entire Executive Branch are lawless. Congress is lawless. The U.S. Supreme Court is lawless. All governors of states, mayors and executives of city and county governments, and police chiefs and sheriffs are lawless. There are no such things as just and incorruptible civic leaders at any level. The systems of checks and balances, so sacred they are, are all citizens have to maintain control over those whom they have elected to serve to protect their property and security, and they are being discarded while we, the people, sit by idly and watch. There is no such thing as social welfare out of necessity which begets liberty; it only begets dependency and slavery. Liberty is only begat by self-reliance, questioning authority, and government not forcibly deposing the people's divine natural rights to sovereignty and of that liberty.

When the first civilized humans formed a society, the lone purpose was to agree upon a mutual collective fraternal pact to secure and to protect each and everyone's property. These societies were very small tribal councils, often nomadic, and advanced in sophistication upon the innovation of agriculture followed by the slow death of the original culture. Yet recall that these communal societies were very small, with everyone bartering for food, caring for his or her fellow man, and all the while, the lone source of violent conflicts were settled whether over the competing for the affections of a female by duels, or by the enforcement of a series of tribal laws. The latter of which became a major factor in the develop of mass civilizations upon the reign of King Hammurabi of Babylon with his "Code of Hammurabi," one of the world's first known series of codified laws seeking justice for one against his violator. 

Government is just because the people, whether wittingly or no, cede to it its legitimacy to govern and to rule. When Barack Obama was elected president of the United States in 2008 and our congressmen and senators to their offices, we the people as a collective and by a plurality coronated them their mandate for power. The scenario with regards to the original archetypes of small nomadic, semi-nomadic, and agrarian societies was largely one in which it was an understood covenant between the occupants. Upon the rise of the phenomena of larger polis', cities, and nations (or what foreigners refer to as "states"), there could no longer be a simple legal system based upon gentlemen's agreements and handshakes. Codified laws of great variety became the norm over the millennia to now involving the bantering between multiple factions, or what we refer to as "political parties," spar over public policy, or if a nation still is a government under the hegemony of the old divine right of monarchs, a supernatural force lending legitimacy to the implementer and enforcer of polity. 

(Above: John Locke, English philosopher and author of Two Treatises on Civil Government, 1689.)

Personally, I classify myself as a conservative-libertarian, not a member of the GOP nor Libertarian Party. I believe all life is sacred and am vehemently opposed to legalized abortions as well as the death penalty, for as John Locke stated within his landmark philosophical work of classical liberalism titled Second Treatise on Civil Government (1689): 

"If man in the state of nature be so free, as has been said; if he be absolute lord of his own person and possessions, equal to the greatest, and subject to no body, why will he part with his freedom? Why will he give up this empire, and subject himself to the dominion and control of any other power? To which it is obvious to answer, that though in the state of nature he hath such a right, yet the enjoyment of it is very uncertain, and constantly exposed to the invasion of others: for all being kings as much as he, every man his equal, and the greater part no strict observers of equity and justice, the enjoyment of the property he has in this state is very unsafe, very unsecure. This makes him willing to quit a condition, which, however free, is full of fears and continual dangers: and it is not without reason, that he seeks out, and is willing to join in society with others, who are already united, or have a mind to unite, for the mutual preservation of their lives, liberties and estates, which I call by the general name, property." (2nd Tr., §123)

With regards to the death penalty, I equate the varied methods of application to the term coined legally as "cruel and unusual punishment." As with the concept of legalized abortions, mankind has no moral high ground nor mandate under God to determine who will live and die, and as an issue of human rights, both abortions and executions violate its very spirit. This is a very left-wing policy that has become a common theme for decades, and yet is an acceptable norm by the majority.

The war on drugs must end and for cities across the nation to be permitted to establish zones for Americanized "red light districts" so long as there can be a vice tax placed upon the once-illegal substances. Government should have no vested interests in regulating what occurs in the bedroom, should extricate itself permanently from the institution of marriage, and should strike from the legal codes any laws prohibiting what and how one may be employed for a living - including legalized prostitution if it can be relegated to controlled environs where the business of sex is paid for and, again, a vice tax levied on this service. No firearms are to ever be forcibly removed from the possession of their owners, nor should there ever be either a list -- national or state -- of registered firearm owners. Furthermore, all people should have the right to carry firearms in public, concealed or non-concealed carry. The borders to Mexico should be completely closed, with a massive military presence along the entire border with the authority to shoot upon sight any Mexican citizen(s) attempting to illegally cross over due to concerns over national security, and for more stringent regulations passed by Congress and signed into law by the president to ensure that those citizens of Mexico who wish to emigrate to the U.S. will be required to do so through the historic proper channels and to learn English as a second language. 

U.S. foreign policy is too convoluted with entanglements and alliances for its welfare. The U.S.'s lone purpose behind a State Department with regards to diplomacy should be to only send its diplomats overseas to foreign nations in order to negotiate trade agreements and better mitigate these scenarios between the U.S. and the said-nation(s). Furthermore, in order to buoy jobs by deregulating the current-ban on opening land for the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline for oil, the U.S. should cut diplomatic relations entirely with all Middle East nations other than Israel. By cutting ties with all Arab League nations, the U.S. will be able to greatly reduce terrorist attacks both on our foreign military bases as well as our embassies, and this includes preventing a future scenario akin to September 11, 2001. Following this, the U.S., in order to further cut ties with foreign nations with regards to military alliances, must withdraw from NATO, for it is our involvement in NATO which leads the nation into feeling the wrath of the European Union's citizens who consider our nation one of imperialists. NATO can and will survive and thrive based upon the combined strengths of the British and French militaries alone; it is also time to lift the ban on German militarization, plus the Cold War has been over for more nearly 25 years. Lastly, the U.S. should issue an ultimatum to the then-current United Nations (U.N.) Secretary General that in order for the U.S. to remain within the worldwide organization, it must agree unconditionally to implement a massive international economic overhaul in foreign nations mired in abject poverty in order to initiate the processes of first industrialization followed by a service-based sector which coincides with the former, while also working to achieve the means to provide for the impoverished youth a quality education, beginning by toppling the dictators in those regimes which perpetuate such tragedies with more than simply the entire U.S. military forces, but rather a truly multinational coalition where no nation's troops comprise of a majority. The U.S. should make it abundantly clear that it no longer intends to pay a penny more towards feeding Global South nations whose food rations often are confiscated by dictators and warlords, and that if these demands are not met, the U.S. will leave the U.N.

With the growing threat from the People's Republic of China and North Korea in the Asia Pacific Rim, the U.S. must reinstate Japan's right to militarize in order to defend herself against the aggressive Chinese and North Korean forces. Trade with Japan is imperative and must be accelerated further; the scenario with the U.S.'s enormous trade deficit with China must be reconciled by the gradual weaning away of the U.S. economy's dependency completely upon all Chinese goods and access to U.S. markets. In this manner, the U.S. economic and foreign policies may indeed kill two birds with one stone. For one, if China decides to invade Taiwan or to engage in military conflict with Japan, their national GDP will decrease significantly to where the world's most populous nation will not be capable of funding a war without facing bankruptcy; and two, this allows the U.S. to begin the long, painstaking processes of rebuilding its long-debilitated industrial base as was once so prevalent many decades ago. 

The economy is of paramount importance, as it ought to be. In order to rebuild the nearly-defunct industrial sector of the economy following the Chinese issues, government must through legislation severely regulate and cripple the power of the labor unions who control the automotive and trade industries, even if it entails revising or the outright abolishing of the Wagner Act of 1938. Due to the enormous power these unions have acquired via coercive negotiations dictated by corrupt power brokers, the rates of pay for workers of particularly American-owned and domestically-located automotive factories are exorbitantly high while the price of production materials is incompatible, which forces American corporations owning these factories to close shop and to engage in corporate flight, thereby laying off thousands of workers and creating economic depressions in towns so dependent upon factory labor for employment. Meanwhile, many departments within the Cabinet of the Executive Branch badly need to be abolished. Among those are as follows: Dept. of Education, Dept. of Highway and Transportation, Dept. of Homeland Security, Dept. of Health and Human Services, Dept. of the Interior, Dept. of Labor, and Dept. of Energy. All that are necessary are Dept. of State, Dept. of Defense, Dept. Treasury, and Dept. of Justice. The U.S. very badly needs to deregulate government to its bare essentials in order to promote economic growth rather than inhibit, and to allow for the freest flow of economic liberty possible. The IRS must be abolished and no progressive income tax either implemented nor enforced in the future. The Federal Reserve must be abolished and most of its duties transferred to the Dept. of the Treasury to reconcile the bureaucratic epicenter of tax dollars spent. The EPA must be abolished and all publicly-owned land bought for and paid by private citizens wishing to preserve via conservation measures the natural beauty of our nation, though they do have the right to sell to the government in the case of such industrial opportunities as the Keystone Pipeline XL project being proposed to provide jobs and precious natural resources to operate machine and heat homes and businesses if the price is match by the government at fair market value. The lone area of the federal government which should unconditionally receive increases in funding is the Dept. of Defense due to the necessity for protecting our borders and maintaining our highway systems as they were originally built in order for the military to more easily cross through the nation rather than rugged terrain. 

Taxation should remain low, and artificially so, in order to prevent government from overspending on wasted endeavors and usurping the role of the sovereignty from the electorate. With regards to this, only indirect taxation by means of national sales and excise taxes should be legal so as to afford the people the proper means to spend and to contribute to the government's acquisition of tax revenue as the economy dictates via the law of averages. No additional paper monies nor coinage should be reproduced artificially without a standard in place. The minimum wage law should be abolished and a market-based driven wages of scale implemented to determine the natural rates of pay. In doing so, the capacity for the people to pay for food, clothing, shelter, and medical care will be greatly mitigated, and the means to acquire health care will deflate in price as is direly needed due to government's past regulations and the currently-detrimental policies emanating from the Affordable Care Act (aka. "Obamacare") rendering the acquisition of medical even with private or public insurance unaffordable. The goal is to reestablish the concepts first advocated by Adam Smith in The Wealth of Nations (1776) and with Milton Friedman: allow the chain of supply correlate with the demand of product. The Gold Standard should be reinstated.  

Finally, as with all areas of the U.S. economy, there should also be a great and intense renewed interest placed upon the revitalization of small businesses. Corporate conglomerations such as Walmart and Sam's Club, CostCo, et. al., must be forced to reduce their grapple hold on the U.S. economy, to end the sale of mass-produced products from China per the previously-stated policy. In essence, Walmart and Sam's Club, along with its major competitor CostCo, must be forced to dispand. Those corporate conglomerates, upon opening stores in small towns across America, have forced the closures of untold numbers of businesses domestically, increasing the rate of unemployment, and for those who manage to find a new employer, often lower pay wages. By focusing on revitalizing small businesses in general, entrepreneurship will be greatly emphasized and encouraged, and the greatest focuses on encouraging such growth will be in both the inner cities where socialism currently reigns supreme by imprisoning good but indigent people capable and desirous for work from finding jobs, and for the small rural areas, rebuilding what are for many of these individuals residing in once-tranquil communities and are now ghost towns, return to them their culture and to the heart of our nation where the enterprising American spirit belongs: in Middle America.

In implementing such policies, the existence of socialism in the U.S. will largely cease to exist. There will be no need for class warfare since all levels of income will be well-adjusted to the low rate of inflation so long as during economic recessions, government does not opt to resort to price fixtures nor artificial means to adjust wages such as the continually flawed and failed policy of increasing minimum wage which manufactures inflation and devalues the salaries of those in the middle class who will have lesser means to pay for goods and services. The Affirmative Action laws should be abolished since racism stems from such a policy rather than the promotion of fair access to all of those who are of the highest qualifications to attain employment. By the present tax codes being completely dissolved and a new one implemented to where the amount of government tax revenues are regulated by the people so as to mitigate in staving off the abusive usurpation which emanates from it, the people have far more disposable income and, as is the trend currently in those states which are less taxed, greater capacities for charitable contributions, Good Samaritan acts, and altruism will greatly increase. With the dissolution of the national public school system, the adults with children will have more disposable income to send their children to any private school -- academies, parochial or church-based schools, Montessori schools -- as they so choose. For those families whose students are financially-disadvantaged and live below the poverty line, it is hoped that with these new policies, future charitable contributions via altruistic funds will be established to pay the tuitions and fees for these children who are just as deserving of a quality education as any other individual; locally, such an endeavor as the privately-funded via donations Joy of Music School is such an example of the ideal situation for the economically-disadvantaged. Colleges, community colleges, and public universities should each merge into a public-corporate cooperative venture at every school, with tax breaks coming to the corporations who choose to endeavor in this project.  

By endeavoring in these policies, all Americans -- not simply white Caucasian citizens -- will once and for all be free to experience the greatest possible liberty that in theory was sought, but never granted to all.

The Legacy of Nelson Mandela and the South African Revolution: Who was the Man Behind the Enigma of the Charismatic Madiba?

Introduction: Describing Nelson Mandela, the Conundrum- A Riddle Intricately Intertwined Within an Enigma

On December 5, 2013, the world lost what the African National Congress (ANC) of South Africa declared to be a "colossus." Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela, born on July 18, 1918, became one with the ages at the ripe old age of 95. The world is engrossed in a state of mourning over the passing of a revolutionary figure universally considered a hero and perhaps worthy of beatification, and the vast majority of the world's literate people are easily provided access to reading of his triumphs, his martyrdom, and the liberation of a most multifarious nation with nearly three-quarters of its citizens. His victory over the evil institution of Apartheid in South Africa is more than considerable because it lifted the oppressed peoples comprised of the black ethnicities in the nation into the realm of being recognized with equal rights under the protections of the law. There can be no mistaken that what Mandela achieve, the figure whom many deify him when the general population of the nation refers to him by first his commonly-known tribal name "Madiba," but also as "Tata," which means "Father." In all, Mandela, through ending the scourge of Apartheid in his beloved South Africa, will forever be remembered as "the father of the nation."

Mandela is often spoken of for his achievements in the same spirit as those of Mohandas "Mahatma" Gandhi of India and Martin Luther King, Jr., the American civil rights figurehead who more than any other figure during the struggles for India's independence from the British Empire by Gandhai and for racial equity and the recognition that all American regardless of race, ethnicity, religion, or creed are loved the same by the one and only God whom all were borne of His Grace. These two revolutionaries in their respective nations represented a form of civil disobedience one would associate with the Transcendentalist principles behind Henry David Thoreau's literary works such as Resistance to Government (also known simply as Civil Disobedience) that was first published in 1849. For Gandhi, he is believed by some scholars to have interpreted Thoreau's definition of civil disobedience to be an argument for pacifism or for exclusively nonviolent resistance to suggest an equivalence between Thoreau's civil disobedience and his own satyagraha, which he defined in his words:

"Truth (satya) implies love, and firmness (agraha) engenders and therefore serves as a synonym for force. I thus began to call the Indian movement Satyagraha, that is to say, the Force which is born of Truth and Love or non-violence, and gave up the use of the phrase “passive resistance”, in connection with it, so much so that even in English writing we often avoided it and used instead the word “satyagraha” itself or some other equivalent English phrase." (Courtesy of Wikipedia)

In September 1935, a letter to P.K. Rao, Servants of India Society, Gandhi disputed the proposition that his idea of Civil Disobedience was adapted from the writings of Thoreau:

"The statement that I had derived my idea of civil disobedience from the writings of Thoreau is wrong. The resistance to authority in South Africa was well advanced before I got the essay of Thoreau on civil disobedience. But the movement was then known as passive resistance. As it was incomplete, I had coined the word satyagraha for the Gujarati readers. When I saw the title of Thoreau’s great essay, I began the use of his phrase to explain our struggle to the English readers. But I found that even civil disobedience failed to convey the full meaning of the struggle. I therefore adopted the phrase civil resistance. Non-violence was always an integral part of our struggle." (Courtesy of Wikipedia)

He described it further as the following:

"I have also called it love-force or soul-force. In the application of satyagraha, I discovered in the earliest stages that pursuit of truth did not admit of violence being inflicted on one’s opponent but that he must be weaned from error by patience and compassion. For what appears to be truth to the one may appear to be error to the other. And patience means self-suffering. So the doctrine came to mean vindication of truth, not by infliction of suffering on the opponent, but on oneself." (Courtesy of Wikipedia)

For Thoreau, however, his position towards unjust laws proving to be injurious to the public such as the peculiar institution of slavery he so detested was that they deserve no respect and should therefore be broken. Thoreau would have consider Gandhi's satyagraha principles to be cowering before the unjust sovereignty of the government, and therefore, emblematic of the "prison" metaphor he described below as the state in which mankind exists under intolerable laws:

"Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison.… where the State places those who are not with her, but against her,– the only house in a slave State in which a free man can abide with honor.… Cast your whole vote, not a strip of paper merely, but your whole influence. A minority is powerless while it conforms to the majority; it is not even a minority then; but it is irresistible when it clogs by its whole weight. If the alternative is to keep all just men in prison, or give up war and slavery, the State will not hesitate which to choose. If a thousand men were not to pay their tax bills this year, that would not be a violent and bloody measure, as it would be to pay them, and enable the State to commit violence and shed innocent blood. This is, in fact, the definition of a peaceable revolution, if any such is possible." (Courtesy of Wikipedia)

 

The Legacy of Nelson Mandela and the South African Revolution: Is America About to Fall Prey to Apartheid-Style Subjugation at the Hands of Islamic-Fascism?

Is America About to Fall Prey to Apartheid-Style Subjugation at the Hands of Islamic-Fascism?

On Thursday, December 5, 2013, Nelson Mandela, the popularly-acknowledged father of modern South Africa, passed onto the annals of Eternity from the cold, harsh realm so brutally characterized of the flesh. His greatest legacy is his decades-long struggle to subvert the minority sovereignty of the Afrikaners who through their formation of the National Party, implemented into law in 1948 the scourge of that nation where three-quarters of the population held no claim to a natural right insured by the government in accordance to the law of nature in the policy known as Apartheid. As the world mourns the passing of the charismatic enigma who was the universally-beloved Madiba in post-Apartheid South Africa, one wonders what his lasting legacy will beget to those who are to comprise of the future generations of the world's population. In attempting to correlate the struggles wrought upon South Africa by the governing minority Afrikaner white elitists with those of other areas of the civilized world, I will begin this multi-part series of commentaries by discussing how the situation in the Middle East is perceived from one perspective of the Jewish state of Israel to the other in the Islamic confederation of nation-states comprised of the Arab League and Iran; and furthermore, the reality of the rapid rise of the worldwide Nation of Islam and the prospect behind the rise of a new caliphate, and ultimate how the rest of the world will react to such a change from the status quo ante.

The Conflict Between the Islamic Confederation of the Arab League and Iran vs. the Jewish State of Israel

(Can political scientists irrefutably describe the situation amid the tensions between the Jewish majority within Israel and those of the Palestinian minority comprised primary of Muslims as being tantamount to the classical characteristics of the conditions normally descriptive of Apartheid?)

The population of Israel as of September 2013 on Rosh Hashanah stood at approximately 8,081,000. The Arab League of 22 nation-states and territories advocating the nationalist culture and policies encompassing Islamic law (Sharia) in many cases is populated by approximately 422 million people, with over half under 25 years of age. There is a gross inequity in terms of the manpower of one nationality (Arab League) over that of the other (Israel) when you consider that based upon its awesome size in both land area and population, it is essentially a confederation of nations which lean upon the legitimacy of Islam to position itself favorably against the Israeli government whom the Arab League considers to be an apparatus of infidels subverting the will of Allah and His Prophet Muhammad. The greatest mistake ever made in this scenario might have been in its initial manifestation: the forced endeavor by the United Nations, spearheaded by President Harry S. Truman in 1948, to establish a Jewish state out of deference to the massacre of millions during the Holocaust under Hitler's regime. When one considers that within 11 minutes of the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel on May 14, 1948 that Truman authorized the U.S. to be the first nation to recognize its sovereignty without making overtures to consulting members of the Arab states within the region who considered this act a breach upon its pan-religious sovereignty as it is to them in violation of Koranic law (again, Sharia), it was a matter of "when" and not "if" there would be the manifestation of a constant state of war between the smaller Jewish state of Israel and a Pan-Arabic alliance committed to wiping Israel off the face of the earth. For the Jews who first settled in the old Holy Land of Judaism, it traded one form of Fascism (Nazism) for another more dangerous version based upon a religious dogma in the name of jihad (Islam). When a far larger population of an ethnicity seeks to commit genocide of a whole religious ethnicity of people as the Jews of Israel based upon its own religious doctrine lending it not simply its own legitimacy for its actions, but the commandment of its supreme deity (Allah), there can be no other end than one of catastrophic implications. However, the ultimate ubiquitous threat resides within the small segment of the Israeli population of Muslims which seek to kill all who are found in violation of Allah and His Prophet Muhammad as well as the artificially demarcated territories in a constant state of flux since the boundaries are always altered between conflicts.

Depending upon your perspective, "freedom fighters" can be ideological demagogues who wage war to liberate its people in order to spread peace across its legions of supporters; in the case of the United States government's definition of such individuals as are descriptive of our Founding Fathers and the patriots who fought the war against Britain, they are classified by the Department of Defense as "terrorists" and "extremists." To Islamic fundamentalists, however, peace can only be achieved by the application of the sword if one does not pledge a vow to Allah's sovereignty; and yet, if this is true, does this not imply that logically-speaking, the militant organizations such as al-Qaeda, Hamas, and the de facto governing army Hezbollah of Lebanon are all "terrorists" and "extremists" as well based upon a religion grounded in fascist characteristics seeking to annihilate an entire religion based upon the prejudices within Koranic doctrine? When these Islamic fundamentalists who comprise of a minority of the Israeli population seek to voice their dissent against the legitimacy of a Jewish government by conducting covert operations by the use of suicide bombers and political assassinations, what do you expect the Israeli government officials to do? Would you simply have them to sit by idly while these subversives of the general will slaughter a nation of millions of Jews all because it is being conducted under the guise of social justice in the name of religious dogma? That is tantamount to what I see when I read of the lurid history of the Afrikaners, who comprise(d) of less than a quarter of the population of South Africa, did when the National Party instituted Apartheid in 1948. The rule of law should always lean in favor of those comprised of the majority of the population in both sentiment and in terms of culture and yet take care in acknowledging the rights of those in the minority, and that was not the case during Apartheid-era South Africa, nor is it the case today in Israel today when the minority sect of the population comprised of Islamic fundamentalists is slaughtering as many Jews and other ethnic and religious peoples declared by them to be infidels in violation of Sharia law as they possibly can. The Israeli citizens of 2013 are not the same social refugees who emigrated to the Holy Land in the mid-1940's upon the U.N. granting it territory; and you therefore cannot accuse them of being guilty of subverting the general will of the Pan-Arabic state as a result. The bottom line is this: What is good for the goose is most certainly good for the gander; and if you wish as a minority sect of "freedom fighters" or "terrorists" -- the choice in nomenclature is yours alone -- to commit genocide by slaughtering scores of Israeli citizens who lend their consent to the legitimacy of the common law system of the Basic Laws of Israel which are heavily-laden with religious Talmudic principles and yet it takes care in legally recognizing the Muslim sect as a religious community, it therefore is indicative of nothing more than these fundamentalists seeking to wipe out all infidels and to coalesce the nations comprising the Arab League into forming at least a region-wide hegemony governed by Sharia, known as the caliphate. The last caliphate died with the Ottoman Empire's collapse in 1924; I suspect that there may be one day another uprising to establish a new one now that the Arab Spring has been in place since December 10, 2010, since every nation which has been toppled ultimately has reverted to a government of elected officials who then stake sovereignty not on the general will of the electorate, but based of Sharia. It is interesting to me that President Obama has completely alienated the Israeli government in favor of championing the Islamic world of the Arab League and Iran. My suspicions are quickly transforming into fears.

No individual or copious demographics of diverse peoples should ever be discriminated against. But then again, just who are we stating is most guilty of the perceived discrimination with the politically-defined borders of the Jewish state of Israel? Can you blame the Jewish population of Israel for feeling paranoid when the main source of the mass attacks on the religious and ethnic majority of the population, again Jewish, are Islamic fundamentalists who comprise predominantly of ethnic Arabs? There is no confusion as to whom or what the Jewish peoples of Israel fear when it comes to the daily question of their very survival since this is, indeed, the case. Our society through the screams of civil rights activists and left-wing demagogues speaks ill of those who perpetuate stereotypes, but I have learned throughout my life that with every stereotype, there is usually a grain or more of truth behind the details; ergo, there are always two sides to every story. Furthermore, how does one embark upon discerning one Muslim from another who each reside within the confederation of the Arab League, which as you asserted is separate from the large representation of Muslims residing in the Balkan Peninsula where the secular authoritarian government under Slobodan Milošević engaged in the ethnic cleansing of the ethnic Albanian Muslims? In the Middle East, there are very close physical resemblances with slight variations from one nationality to another within the Arab League of nations of those comprised within the Arabic ethnic demographic, and nearly all of those nationalities -- Libya, Egypt, Tunisia, Algeria, Syria, Lebanon, etc., -- which are experiencing some extreme of the Arab Spring phenomena are falling prey to the trend that so many revolutions have followed that led from one lesser form of tyranny to another that is worse. If your assertion that most Muslims adhere to the concept that Islam is a religion of peace, why then do they turn a deferential eye to the atrocities committed by those who are declared to be part of a violent fundamentalist minority who are literally following the verses within the Koran to the very letter in accordance to Sharia law? The only known form of peace through the manifestation of a society of equity for Islamic fundamentalists is through the coercion of the citizens of a nation of infidels to either convert or be forced to live in a permanent state of subjugation under Islamic domination, and therefore all are equal under the rule of Sharia, including the brutal consequences those found guilty of violating Allah's teachings will be forced to suffer. (An interesting series of Koranic verses to read can be found here, though I am sure some who read this will simply state that I am using a source with an agenda against the Islamic faith when in fact, these are actual verses from within The Koran's texts courtesy of the article on Islam and Forced Conversion article on the webpage titled The Religion of Peace.) Perhaps those who truly adhere to the peaceful principles of Islam sincerely believe it to be a religion of peace, but the jihadists who have carried out these attacks against those considered to be infidels have killed approximately 270 million over the history of the religion, and those among the declared infidel ranks in a nation have every right to fear Muslims if the peaceful ones are complicit in ignoring atrocities committed by the perceived minority which ultimately are becoming the sovereign leaders in the Islamic state of the Middle East during the Arab Spring. (See Tears of Jihad, courtesy of the webpage "Political Islam.")

Conclusion: A Dire Warning for Future Generations of Desperate Citizens Seeking to Subvert the Legitimacy their Current Tyrants in Order to Replace It with One Not Guaranteed to Not Be Worse than the Predecessors

If a national identity of peoples are to fight a revolution on the grounds of liberty, equality, and fraternity, what does one predicate the premises behind what that equality is to entail? Does it mean that all people are equal under the rule of law as pertaining to what the Islamic fundamentalists believe to be achieved not through the voluntary consent of the governed, but rather through the deceptive art of murana or forcible coercion? In Revolutionary France (1789-99), the mantra used to rally the masses to subvert the Bourbon monarchy was one of "liberté, égalité, fraternité" for all the French people, and the movement was initiated by a relatively benign method in comparison to what would come later of a mob of sans culottes storming the Bastille prison where debtors and political prisoners were jailed. The revolution evolved into a virtual collective anarchy upon one coup d'tat in Maxmillien Robespierre's Committee of Public Safety who initiated the infamous Reign of Terror (1793-95) which led to the deaths of tens, perhaps hundreds of thousands of French citizens and partisan revolutionaries alike yet another, which also derived its legitimacy from the mythical power of a finite entity sans the essential supernatural or metaphysical qualities to unite the people under a set of moral standards by which the population could generally agree as its uniformity amid a cultural norm. It happened again in 1795 with the rise of the Directory, which executed the previous despotic governing body (again, the Committee of Public Safety and Robespierre) when it condemned those oligarchs to the guillotine just as deposed victims had done so with the Bourbon family in 1793. In the end, a feudalistic system which begat inequities between the three Estates under the divine right of kings transferred into two subsequent ones which were predicated upon atheist principles, only to conclude in 1799 when the obscure Corsican general Napoleon Bonaparte seized power by throwing his own coup d'tat and establishing his hegemony over most of continental Europe by spreading the ideals of the French Revolution, while consolidating an imperial monarchy which restored aspects of the deposed Ancien Régime. In summation, the French Revolution was a ten year roller coaster ride from one form of imperial monarchy to another one founded upon the coup of 18 Brumaire which installed the Consulate and, in essence, manifested a French society governed by a military dictator (again, Napoleon Bonaparte) under the new Constitution of the Year VIII that was approved in a plebiscite held the following January, with 99.94 percent officially listed as voting "yes" -- which no doubt was fraudulently manipulated. Napoleon was bent upon dominating the peoples of the European continent and spread his self-manifestation of legitimacy by a conquest for empire. To make it appear as if his power was derived in accordance to divine right, the irony is that there was no democracy of a to truly lend nor deny him consent other than the coercion to cede their sovereignty to Napoleon I, the new Emperor of the French Empire, whose legitimacy was acquired by political intrigue as he summoned Pope Pius VII to his coronation in 1804 in what became a rather bizarre ceremony where Napoleon seized the crown from the pontiff and placed it upon his own head. Power is intoxicating, no matter the source of the hegemons' claim(s) legitimacy. 

What do all of these tumultuous conflicts have in common? Well, nearly every revolution which has ever been fought for and won throughout the past 238 years has been spearheaded most aggressively by a loud minority whose bellicose cries and saber-rattling led to the conquest of the old order and the implementation of a new one which was nearly always more brutal and totalitarian or authoritarian in nature. The leftist revolutions in Russia, China, and others under the concept the U.S. termed to be the "Domino Theory" of Communism's global spread were conducted by a small faction of political ideologues classified as members of an intellectual elite who believed that they were so enlightened as to know what was best for the general welfare of the public better than did the actual citizens, and their ideas of absolute equity under the rule of law -- and it was always absolute equity they promised -- appealed to the uneducated, unenlightened masses. When the people would finally rally behind these enigmatic, charismatic demagogues upon their movement gaining strength, the tide of populist sentiment crushed the opposition of the old imperialist guard, and in its wake would transfer its consent over to a new government promising to create a Utopian society of peace achieved through all being equal under the rule of the new oligarchy, this one being the intellectual elitist/ideologues who issued the guarantees for liberation. Unfortunately, Lord Acton was all too correct when he stated that "absolute power corrupts absolute," and no matter what the source of legitimacy is in how a politician stakes claim to its legitimacy, the truth, however inconvenient when an educated elitist attempts to intellectualize how to solve a social conundrum, can always be manipulated in order to serve the best interests of the rulers in power at the detriment nearly always of the people. Rousseau stated that might does not always make right, but if that is the case, what is right to those who have shanghaied the general will of the people into lending popular consent to the new ruling apparatus in power is ultimately always right in its absolutism over all regardless of what is truly just since in the world of politics, the ends will always be justified by the means per Machiavellian principles of wielding power in terms of what for them is politically expedient since the people who fought the revolution to accord them their consent to the rulers' legitimacy to govern will have tacitly agreed to these measures through their social contract; ergo, they are contractually bound to adhere to the terms of their acquired freedom from the previous masters, according to Rousseau. And as Islam is currently the fastest growing religion in followers in the world, the dilemma then becomes as to how the world will reconcile this emerging colossus of faith should the popularly-acknowledged minority of the religion, the fundamentalist-jihadists, continue to serve as the face of an entire religion in which the fear of its violent history is to be both legitimate and justifiable in terms of the threats posed to the peace and stability of the status quo ante.

In the case of a desperate people seeking liberation from a despotic governing apparatus, the prevailing wisdom should always be the following: a people should always take great care amid caution in considering to whom it chooses to lend its consent, for if the subjugated peoples are too desperate, the figure who offers to liberate them if they should choose to support it in return for the abdication of their sovereignty as a collective of individuals living according to one of a long- established standard of universal mores will do so at the cost of their own dignity, salvation, but ultimately, the stilling of the heartbeat of a once harmonious social conscience since their old core beliefs will no longer be legally acceptable and the liberty for which they fought to attain will have been a mirage amid the blood on their hands and the deception will have begat their self-inflicted doom due to their naïveté.

The Division Among Conservatives Over Sarah Palin (Repost)

(Left: Sarah Palin, former governor of Alaska and GOP vice presidential candidate of John McCain in 2008.)

Sarah Palin was the first female vice presidential candidate to run as a Republican. She served what essentially was the conservative wing of the McCain presidential ticket. Almost immediately, McCain's presidential prospects skyrocketed, albeit temporarily. The Arizona senator's reputation was one historically associated with that of a moderate. The non-partisan National Journal rates a Senator's votes by what percentage of the Senate voted more liberally, and what percentage more conservatively, in three policy areas: economic, social, and foreign. For 2005–2006 (as reported in the 2008 Almanac of American Politics), McCain's average ratings were as follows: economic policy: 59 percent conservative and 41 percent liberal; social policy: 54 percent conservative and 38 percent liberal; and foreign policy: 56 percent conservative and 43 percent liberal. Columnists such as Robert Robb and Matthew Continetti have used a formulation devised by William F. Buckley, Jr. to describe McCain as "conservative" but not "a conservative," meaning that while McCain usually tends towards conservative positions, he is not "anchored by the philosophical tenets of modern American conservatism." As both a daredevil and self-proclaimed "maverick," McCain named Palin, then the governor of Alaska and a relative unknown in the national political scene, as the vice presidential candidate in 2008. The rest, as they say, is history.

Perhaps my fondest memory of Palin was her Vice Presidential Debate with Sen. Joe Biden. Of course, a monkey can beat Biden with half his or her brain tied behind his back just to make it fair, but give Palin credit in how she scored big points against Biden's incompetence in the following video:

Gov. Palin is perhaps the most important figure along with Ron Paul in the history of the Tea Party movement. She is also a source of great division with the Republican Party. Her recent dissatisfaction with the 14 GOP senators who voted to pass the immigration bill so disgusted her that she threatened to leave the party and a form new political party, the Freedom Party. This, of course, has caused a major uproar within the conservative community. It is Sarah Palin who has been chiefly responsible for achieving the vast majority of congressmen and senators elected to office (Sen. Rand Paul and Sem. Ted Cruz, anyone?) through her activism as de facto head of the Tea Party movement in recent years. By doing this, she would damage the GOP's abilities to get leaders elected because the party has undertaken a policy of discouraging and dissolving grassroots efforts by people such as you and me in working campaigns for the party's candidates. She is a brilliant politician, and indeed I would not mind betting that if she were to run for president and win, she would be America's version of "The Iron Lady" Margaret Thatcher. 

Through two articles posted on one of my favorite websites, Commentary Magazine, I am going to provide you with two diametrically opposing perspectives on her recent rhetoric based on such intentions as leaving the party as well as her interest in running for the U.S. Senate from the State of Alaska.

The first two are the most recent. This is slam on her political lackadaisical nature, or his perception of such a manifestation, by Peter Wehner, from July 8, 2013:

The GOP Is More Serious Than Sarah Palin

 Peter Wehner | @Peter_Wehner

07.08.2013 - 10:25 AM

In a recent interview, former Alaska governor and GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin indicated she was open to leaving the GOP and starting a third party. After expressing her enthusiasm for the name “The Freedom Party,” Palin went on to say this: 

"If the GOP continues to back away from the planks in our platform, from the principles that built this party of Lincoln and of Reagan, then yeah, more and more of us are gonna start saying, “You know, what’s wrong with being an independent?” Kind of, with that libertarian streak that much of us have. In other words, we want government to back off and not infringe upon our rights. I think there will be a lot of us who start saying, “GOP, if you abandon us, what–we have nowhere else to go except to become more independent and not enlisted in a, one or the other of the private majority parties that rule in our nation — either a Democrat or a Republican.” Remember these are private parties. And no one forces us to be enlisted in either party."

Let’s begin with this observation: Ms. Palin is a fierce opponent of immigration reform, and any openness by the Republican leadership in the House would move her a good deal closer to abandoning the GOP. Which of course makes her reference to both Lincoln and Reagan odd, since Reagan was an advocate of amnesty and as president granted it to millions of illegal immigrants (“I believe in the idea of amnesty for those who have put down roots and have lived here even though sometime back they may have entered illegally,” Reagan said in his 1984 debate with Walter Mondale). 

As for Lincoln, in a new biography on him, Rich Lowry points out that “Lincoln was broadly pro-immigration… Clearly, Lincoln’s default position today would be generosity toward immigrants. The effectively permanent status as second-class citizens of millions of illegal immigrants would be anathema to him.” In their tone and substantive approach to legal and illegal immigration, then, people like Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush are far closer to Reagan and Lincoln than Ms. Palin is.

And what about the broader indictment by Palin, which is that the GOP is moving away from its principles and becoming a less conservative party? That charge–shared by some others on the right–strikes me as rather wide of the mark. After all, in many respects the GOP is becoming more amenable to her brand of Tea Party conservatism than it was in and prior to 2008–when Palin was a proud Republican and the party’s vice presidential pick.

For example, a smaller percentage of GOP senators voted for immigration reform last month than was the case in 2006. Representative Paul Ryan has on several occasions now presented a very serious plan to re-limit government and reform entitlements, especially Medicare–and in doing so he has gone far beyond anything that Ronald Reagan ever proposed. And to the astonishment of many, Ryan secured the support of virtually the entire Republican House. In addition, the GOP has uniformly opposed higher taxes. (Compare this once again to Reagan, who in 1982 signed what at the time was the largest tax increase in American history.) In fact, congressional Republicans have consistently been pushing for tax cuts. They accepted sequester cuts earlier this year, when many on the right predicted they would buckle. House and Senate Republicans have also opposed, almost to a person, the Affordable Care Act, and pushed for its repeal. Republicans voted en masse against the 2009 stimulus package. The GOP remains staunchly pro-life. It has opposed the president’s gun control and climate change agenda. And many Republicans have backed away from a larger federal role in education. Then there are Republican governors, current and recent, many of whom are conservative, successful and reform-oriented. 

Let’s stipulate that no party is perfect, that different currents exist within political parties, and that key figures within them will act in ways with which we disagree. The GOP certainly isn’t fully abiding by my recommendations. That said, where precisely is this great abandonment of principle we’re supposedly seeing? The GOP is in many ways a more conservative party today than it was during the Reagan years.

Several things are happening, I think. One is that some elements within the GOP base are in an agitated mood, spoiling for a fight, eager to make themselves look principled by constantly asserting the GOP is unprincipled. It’s similar to a quarrelsome marriage; every word one spouse says is interpreted in the worst possible light by the other. Sarah Palin and those like her are now disposed to attack the GOP, and perhaps even looking for reasons to break from it. But let’s be clear: It’s being driven by her/their frame of mind, not the heresies of the Republican Party. 

The other thing that is occurring is that Palin and those like her have undergone a fairly dramatic shift in the last few years. One telling example is her reaction to Edward Snowden and the National Security Agency leaks. Palin has gone out of her way to defend Snowden  and asserted that America is “becoming a totalitarian surveillance state.” This is a silly charge–and evidence that Palin has lurched in a much more libertarian direction since she enthusiastically agreed to be John McCain’s running mate in 2008.

It may also be that Palin, having quit after serving less than one term as governor, is simply not very serious about, or even all that interested in, governing. She does seem better suited to compose tweets and star in reality shows than to carry out the duties of governing.

But Ms. Palin is right about this: No one forces us to be enlisted in either party. She is free to leave the GOP at any time, for any reason. And there may be more than a few Republicans who hope she will, if only so that they do not have to spend any more time explaining to the rest of the world why the GOP, for all its shortcomings, is far more serious than Sarah Palin. 

____

The GOP is notorious for its dubious record with women voters, and there are still far fewer conservative Republican politicians throughout the nation than there are liberal ones. To suggest that the GOP would be willing to see her leave is ludicrous. She would serve the party well to draw the attention of not only more conservative and libertarian voters, but those of the female population as well. However, I will have to acknowledge a correct statement by Wehner regarding Palin's grasp of history. Reagan did, indeed, declare that he was in favor of amnesty in the 1984 Presidential Debate with Walter Mondale on foreign policy. It also is one of the few parts of the Reagan platform that I find highly undesirable. While it is crucial that every politician know his or her history in order to properly base his or her decisions, it is quite common for them to fail this key test, and it is met with disastrous results. Still, history is a massive subject, perhaps the deepest in its breadth of detail in all the academies, and though Palin is a politician, a highly-influential politician I might add, her degree from the University of Idaho is in Communications with an emphasis in Journalism, not History. One cannot be an expert at everything, and yet we, the American people, expect our elected officials to be more than simply "a jack of all trades and a master of none." We expect them to be God-like. That is the quality the Democrats want you to believe they possess, and they portray it so well that the party has dominated the electoral process for more than 80 years. Thus, humanity is refreshing, but we must still strive for our best "selves" we can be.

The next article is from July 10, 2013, and was authored by Jonathan S. Tobin. Unlike the previous article, this one is supports Palin, encouraging her to run for the U.S. Senate: 

Contentions

Run, Sarah, Run and Keep Running

Jonathan S. Tobin

07.10.2013 - 12:10 PM

Was Sarah Palin just teasing us last night when she let drop on Sean Hannity’s Fox News show that she was considering running for the U.S. Senate next year? Maybe. Palin, as Politico notes today, will generally do or say anything in order to create some buzz in the media. It’s hard to find too many serious political observers who think that four years after she abruptly resigned her post as governor of Alaska, the 2008 Republican vice presidential candidate is willing to do the hard work of running for office rather than just running her mouth on television. Nor would it seem likely that she would put her celebrity status in jeopardy by running the risk of being defeated, either in a primary or in a general election.

But, at least for the sake of argument, let’s take her at her word and say that she really is considering challenging incumbent Democrat Mark Begich in 2014. If so, my advice to her is that she should do it.

Doing so might not be the safest play for preserving her “brand” as a pundit at least in the short term since it would take her off of television and the lecture circuit and possibly bring her career as a bankable personality to a premature end. Nor would it necessarily be what Senate Republicans want to happen since they would probably prefer a less controversial mainstream conservative to be the GOP nominee in a race for what ought to be a winnable seat for the party. But if Palin really wants to have an impact on the future of her party and her country and to revive her flagging popularity and chances for a future presidential run, trying for the Senate in 2014 is the only choice.

After four years as the queen of conservative snark, it’s hard to remember that once upon a time, Palin was one of the bright, young stars of the Republican Party with a hard-won reputation as a fresh, independent voice that was willing to challenge a corrupt state party establishment. That Sarah Palin was not so much an ideologue as she was a doer. Perhaps if John McCain had not listened to those conservative pundits who swooned over Palin’s obvious political talent and good looks and made her his personal Hail Mary play to transform a 2008 presidential election that he was bound to lose anyway, she might now be in the middle of a second successful term as Alaska governor and be one of the GOP’s favorites for 2016. A few more years in Juneau being a good governor and a careful rollout of her national profile in which she could portray herself as conversant on national issues would probably have been the best thing for her career, as well as for her family.

But that was not to be. Palin made a powerful first impression on the country with as brilliant a convention speech as could have been imagined, but soon crashed and burned in national interviews and, unfortunately, became the scapegoat for a poorly run McCain campaign as well as the primary focus for left-wing hate and liberal media bias. In the next year, she ditched her governorship and then proceeded to make a spectacle of herself on reality TV. The worst of it wasn’t so much her poor career choices and the way her family became a tabloid staple. The most dispiriting thing about Palin’s career arc is the way her bitterness at the media and other Republicans became the primary focus of her rhetoric. Rather than going to school on the issues and making herself ready for the next political challenge, she seemed content to become a sideshow for the grass roots, pandering to the worst instincts of her party and often appeared foolish rather than being a thoughtful contributor.

To note this unfortunate descent is not to ignore her still potent ability to generate publicity and draw crowds. Her interventions in some Republican primaries helped conservatives like Ted Cruz and Kelly Ayotte win Senate seats. Her raw political talent and speaking ability is still there even if it is most often used to rail at her enemies rather than to demonstrate thoughtful stands on the issues.

Doing so has kept her admirers happy and preserved her niche as a flame-throwing snark machine of the right. But she has to know that this routine has a limited shelf life. With the GOP now possessed of a deep bench of stars who are potential 2016 candidates, Palin is very much yesterday’s news and has already been eclipsed by people like Cruz and Rand Paul even among her own fan base. As the years go by, her appeal and her celebrity are bound to wane. Sooner or later, if she is to go on being treated–at least by people like Hannity, if few others even in the conservative media–as a big deal, she’s going to have to do something more than talk shows. The 2014 Alaska Senate race may be the best opportunity to do so that she will ever get.

That said, Palin would have to do more than merely throw her hat in the ring to beat Begich. As one poll taken earlier this year made clear, even in Alaska her negative poll ratings are through the roof as much as they are nationally. The fact that a staggering 59 percent of Alaskans view her negatively with only 35 percent seeing her in a positive light might be enough to deter her—or any rational politician—from running. But it’s not as if any of the other likely Republican senatorial candidates look to be doing much better. In particular, the prospect of Tea Party favorite Joe Miller taking another try at the Senate isn’t scaring Begich. Miller beat Lisa Murkowski in a 2010 GOP primary but then lost the general election to her when she ran as an independent, and he isn’t likely to do much better this year. And while Begich has decent poll numbers, he is still a Democrat running in an overwhelmingly Republican state. Moreover, everyone knows that prosecutorial misconduct that helped convict the late Ted Stevens on corruption charges is the only reason Begich is currently sitting in the Senate.

A Senate campaign would put her to the test and even her sternest critics should not assume she would fail this time. It may be that Palin has become too polarizing a political personality to win any election, even in deep red Alaska. But she owes to herself and to her supporters to try. She almost certainly will never be president, but a Senate seat is not beyond her grasp. While I’m far from sure that her contribution to the national debate would be enlightening, it would be entertaining. 

____

The division within the GOP, even in supporting her run for the U.S. Senate, is startling. She is considered unenlightened, lacking in intellectual depth; qualities the party seeks to extricate from their persona in accordance to what the Left through the mass media attempts to stamp upon every party member in general. There have been very few politicians in the history of the United States who were philosophical giants: Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Ronald Reagan are to name a few. Sarah Palin may not be one like the majority of the others, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. She is an excellent speaker and a brilliant politician, "the queen of conservative snark," and furthermore depicts herself as the typical Middle American hockey mom who puts her children first and who would no doubt in my mind serve to coalesce the various factions of the party. 

Unfortunately, there is also the issue plaguing Gov. Palin regarding her public perception. As I state that her good qualities would no doubt serve her well as a source of party unity, her poll figures reflect otherwise. Even in heavily-conservative Alaska, 59% of the state's 600,000 +/- population view her negatively, while only 35% see her in a positive light. I am reminded, though, that Thatcher only averaged an approval rating of 40% in Britain, but she was a highly-successful prime minister because she won the general elections three times. Palin could be our "Iron Lady," but the only way she will achieve this will be to toss the die and run for the U.S. Senate. 

Commentary Magazine is probably the most brutally honest of all the conservative-libertarian online publications I have read, and they pull no punches. There are literally dozens, maybe over 100, articles about her of varying opinions. One characteristic that even her staunchest allies among the site's commentators have noted is her lack of intelligence, albeit they will rarely state it in that fashion. This is a characteristic with which Democrats are endowed, but as I have said before, they always coalesce when it involves implementing public policy whereas the GOP splinters.

My sincere hope is to draw as many intelligent, energetic women into the GOP as possible. We already know the party will never receive a majority of the women's votes in elections because the majority of them want to be allowed to have promiscuous sex without fear of being legally coerced in acting responsibly upon becoming pregnant. These women not only desire this, they want the taxpayers to fund their abortions. With my having stated this, it is a shame the party is running off two of its most energetic female political figures in Palin and Michele Bachmann, though I am fully aware that Bachmann is being investigated for campaign finance improprieties from her presidential campaign last year. There will always be upstanding citizens willing to serve the American people within the GOP, but they were perhaps the most vocal of those we have ever had in modern times who were women, at least since the first female congresswoman Jeanette Rankin, the pacifist who served as the representative from Montana during World War I on two different occasions and later ran for the U.S. Senate during her early 90's in order to voice her opposition to the Vietnam War. Too often, women receive the short-end of the stick within the party, whether it is because the consensus within the GOP is that these women are not intelligent enough ideologically to represent the party's interests, or in the case of Kay Bailey Hutchison, who was the U.S. Senator from Texas that Ted Cruz replaced, they are too far to the left in their beliefs and therefore do not fall in line with what the party wishes out of its leadership.At some point, the party needs to awaken and "smell the roses." No one politician has ever been perfect, not even Ronald Reagan, who supported amnesty for illegal immigrants. I do wish for Palin to run for the U.S. Senate seat out of Alaska because I believe she would win as Alaska is overwhelmingly a conservative Republican stronghold in the nation. Whether Palin is an intellectual or not is pointless; being a politician does not require one to hold a Ph.D., in Political Science, History, or Philosophy. I do believe that the party needs to cease this folly of eliminating all grassroot efforts within its establishment because this is where the Democrats are growing stronger by the day and with each election year. When the Democrats around the nation and liberal political commentators on the major cable news networks claim that the GOP is out of touch with the average American, I cannot argue with them because they are absolutely correct in this assertion. The party is in major trouble, and even those whom have long been members of the establishment are bitterly complaining how it has taken a turn for the worse. I would not be surprised is Rush Limbaugh is correct about the Republicans losing the House in the 2014 elections because the party is totally and utterly incompetent politically. The GOP is on the precipice of an abysmal fall into obscurity much like it experienced for more than 60 years other than three presidents winning election and another replacing his corrupt predecessor. Rather than the party biting off its nose just to spite its face, why not implement better methods of reaching as many people as possible? Surely it cannot hurt.