Henry Lamb introduces us to a book by Beverly Eakman, "A Common Sense Platform for the 21st Century." It sounds like a great book, and I will definitely read it, eventually. I am especially curious about what Beverly writes about the political party system and "the effectiveness and potential of third-party initiatives."
This post is just an FYI about a book we should all read, and therefor, there will be no further commentary on my part. Just sayin'...
The book concludes with an insightful discussion of the political party system in the United States, and particularly the effectiveness and potential of third-party initiatives. Eakman examines the role the media play in advancing or destroying political agendas, noting that it is common practice among socialists to ignore the opposition agenda and destroy people who advance an opposing agenda. This tactic was especially successful in the Delaware and Nevada Senate races where the opposition candidates were unmercifully demeaned personally, with no attention paid by the media to the issues the candidates advanced.
This platform for the 21st century could not have arrived at a better time. With the new Congress convening after the holidays, and the next presidential election cycle already under way, this book should be required reading for every elected official, every candidate, campaign worker and, indeed, for every American.
Pundits, politicians, and even ordinary people are mystified by the rise of the tea parties' protest of the Democrats' agenda. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called the spontaneous uprising from the grass roots "Astroturf" – just before she lost her gavel to the Republicans. King George imposed his agenda over the objections of subjects – just before he lost both his subjects and his colonies to the power of people in pursuit of freedom.
Once again, people are rising up in defense of freedom against a "… Marxist-like takeover of Congress in 2008 … that launched audacity and intimidation to new heights," says Beverly Eakman in her latest book, titled "A Common Sense Platform for the 21st Century." Eakman contends that the nation may well be at a point in history quite similar to the days leading to the revolution, in which the people had to decide whether to accept the status quo or risk treasure, and even life, to enjoy the freedom endowed by the Creator.
Her concise 120-page book uses the first chapter to analyze the state of the nation and the reasons for it. Eakman, herself an educator, takes direct aim at the nation's education system for training generations of people to focus on the collective rather than the individual, and on government largesse rather than individual responsibility. This emphasis has taught too many people that freedom is less important than comfort. Consequently, she says, "Our nation is devolving into just one more overbearing, top-heavy bureaucracy that controls through intimidation, red tape, paperwork and redistribution under some convenient pretext." Eakman further observes:
Thanks to 40 years of watered-down schooling, most of today's adults do not recall exactly how we got where we are now. Consequently, many of us have become closet Marxist-socialists without even realizing it.
The rise of the tea parties is evidence of a growing rebellion among people unwilling to accept this current reality. This is a time of great opportunity, or great danger. It is a time to realize that the future cannot be left to any political party, but must be guided by solid, proven principles. Eakman examines these principles in the context of current issues. Chapter 2 categorizes America's most pressing issues: constitutional powers; founding ideals; national sovereignty; criminal justice and law enforcement; national defense; economic stability; health care; research; environment; and education. These issues must be addressed from the perspective of constitutional principles, not political expedience.
Chapter 3 is devoted to identifying specific examples of the "train of abuses and usurpations" imposed by a federal government that has been allowed to grow well beyond the size and power ever intended by the founders. As an example of the federal government's ridiculous misuse of power, Eakman offers the required pat down or X-ray of every air traveler to protect against terrorists, while abandoning a 32-mile stretch along the Mexican border where law-enforcement officers are not allowed, for fear of damaging an endangered species. This makes the entire area a safe-zone for smugglers, terrorists and illegal immigrants to enter anytime they wish. Additional examples of current abuses fill Chapter 4. In a very few pages, Eakman provides solid evidence of a government run amok.
The principles that must guide the development and implementation of a 21st-century platform must include: fiscal responsibility; constitutionally limited government; free markets; and an environment of integrity, decency and self control. Chapter 5 gets more specific in its identification of the principles that must be honored: private property rights; non-intervention in the marketplace by government entities; reversal of entitlements and redistribution policies; rededication to America, as opposed to self-defeating "globalization" polices.
Shamefully, a number of establishment Republicans have borrowed the favorite strategy of the left: Isolate and disparage your opponent. It's like the last gasp of a dying dinosaur. Christine O'Donnell has been broke most of her life. Christine O'Donnell had a tax lien filed against her. And Christine O'Donnell lost her home through foreclosure as a result of that tax lien.
Calling all RINOS: Tea-party voters do not view these as negatives. Christine O'Donnell is us! She represents everything tea-party people are mad about. Tax liens make them angry at Washington, not at the person who is on the receiving end of the tax lien. Foreclosures make them mad at Washington, which is the real source of most people's financial problems, not at the person whose house has been foreclosed.
Before you read on, there is something to straighten out concerning what Robert wrote about Christine O'Donnell's tax lien and financial problems. Because of the way the media has gone after Christine on her personal life rather than on the issues, it is important that we know the truth about this candidate. In the video below, starting at 6:10, she gives her side of the story about the tax lien and other financial issues. However, I recommend that you watch the entire video of this segment:
Christine O'Donnell on Hannity - Part 1 (Click here for Part 2)
Robert Ringer says something in this column that I have been saying, or at least thinking, for a long, long time: "They want everyday folks to go to Washington." Unfortunately, that is getting harder and harder for everyday people to be able to do because of the growing campaign costs. However, as Christine O'Donnell has shown, it can be done, at least in her primary victory over Mike Castle. She did it with a tenth of the money that Castle spent, and surely much less name recognition. I am hoping that her victory will prove to the Beltway establishment Republicans just how important the Tea Party Movement is. I am also praying that it will encourage other patriots to step up to the plate to take on the establishment politicians from either party, at all levels of government. Just sayin'...
Tea-party voters are savvy enough to realize that none of Christine O'Donnell's personal misfortunes would stop her from voting no to every unconstitutional spending bill served up by congressional progressives. That is what they are looking for in a candidate.
Say what you will about Sarah Palin, she gets it. So does Michele Bachmann, Paul Ryan, Jim DeMint, Ron Paul, Tom Price and a bunch of other tea-party types in the House and Senate. None of them are perfect when it comes to voting – it's an ugly, rough-and-tumble contact sport up there on Capitol Hill – but they're at least making a sincere effort to dramatically reduce government spending and government power. If all Republicans in the House and Senate were in line with them, the future of both our economy and our freedom would look much different than it does today.
Half or more of the American people don't want candidates with experience. They don't want candidates with blue-ribbon credentials. They don't want candidates with Kennedy-like pedigrees. They want everyday folks to go to Washington and repeal Health-care Hell and every other piece of legislation that is unconstitutional. And, yes, they want all entitlement programs phased out.
By now, people should be beyond surprise when a tea-party candidate upsets an establishment Democrat or Republican – either in a primary or regular election. After all, they've had a year to get used to it.
Nevertheless, the tidal wave of tea-party-candidate victories continues to surprise – and upset – many media pundits and, even more so, establishment politicians. Every possible attempt has been made to marginalize the tea-party people as extremists, but I think it's safe to say that that's a battle that was over a long time ago – and the losers were the hate-mongering left and disbelievers on the establishment right.
But now we've crossed into a danger zone. Trent Lott says that "As soon as (newly elected tea-party people) get here, we need to co-opt them." And, once again displaying the RINO willingness to compromise principles, House Republican Leader John Boehner said, on "Face the Nation," that he would vote for a tax cuts for people making under $250,000 a year (leaving out those with incomes higher than $250,000) if that's his "only option."
Finally, the shocker: The ever-astute Karl Rove, who has been a strong tea-party supporter, allowed a bit of establishment bias to surface when he lambasted the tea party's newest star, Christine O'Donnell. I have no doubts that Rove sincerely believes that establishment candidate Mike Castle, a nine-term congressman, had a much better chance of winning Joe Biden's old Senate seat in Delaware than O'Donnell.
But that misses the point. In fact, in an unintended way, the great non-entity David Gergen – of CNN non-fame – made the best case against Castle by lamenting, "O'Donnell's opponent knew how to work with Democrats." How's that for an endorsement?
The question is, what do establishment Republicans think they would have gained by Castle's election to the Senate? The notion that the Republican's main goal should be to get majorities in both the House and Senate is badly flawed. Having a majority doesn't mean anything if a significant number of that majority repeatedly backs socialist bills offered up by Democrats. They may just as well be Democrats.
So long as Republicans in the Senate include constitutionally subversive progressives like John McCain, Richard Lugar, Orrin Hatch, Susan Collins, Lindsey Graham and Olympia Snowe – to name but a handful of examples – having a "majority" is meaningless.
What a large number of Republicans cannot seem to come to grips with is that tea-party people are simply everyday Americans. In fact, most tea-party people have never gone to a tea-party rally, but feel just as strongly about what is happening to America as those who are actively involved in the movement.
If there is any hope for the Republican Party to survive, the word compromise must be eradicated from the minds of philosophically confused "conservatives" in their ranks. You cannot compromise between right and wrong. You cannot compromise between freedom and slavery. You cannot comprise between stealing and respecting the property of others. You cannot compromise between constitutional and unconstitutional.
To the Republican establishment, tea-party people are field hands. Their labors are to be recognized and rewarded, but they are to stay off the porch and not presume to sit at the master's table.
And what O'Donnell did, with her amazing victory, is to imperil that establishment's return to power. That is why these Republicans went ballistic.
O'Donnell's conservative convictions and Castle's social liberalism mean nothing to them.
Christine O'Donnell on Fox and Friends: She can win!
Pat Buchanan explains just exactly what is wrong with the Beltway Republican establishment, and he does it without even using the word "RINO." And actually, I am sure that is purposeful. Not all of the establishment Republicans are Republicans In Name Only. Some of them actually are Conservatives, at least to some degree. Not all of them are Progressives as some people might want to believe.
There is an explanation for why both Conservative AND Progressive Republicans make up the Beltway Republican establishment, and it has a lot to do with why they became upset about Christine O'Donnell winning the Delaware nomination for the U.S. Senate seat. You see, if there are enough Republicans of whatever stripe they come in, to make up a majority in the U.S. Senate, they then regain the committee chairmanships. And that, folks, is what this is all about: Personal power.
The Beltway Republican establishment is showing their true colors by being down in the dumps about O'Donnell winning, rather than Mike Castle, who they felt could and would win the Delaware Senate seat formerly held by Joe Biden. As Karl Rove said, more or less, "Now the Republicans may only win 7 or 8 seats instead of 8 or 9." You see, it didn't matter if Castle was a RINO. They just wanted the Republican majority in the Senate for their own personal power.
The good news is that on November 3, the Beltway Republican establishment may just wake up to find out that Christine O'Donnell will be representing the State of Delaware in the U. S. Senate. And if that is the case, Jim DeMint will have one more excellent ally in the U.S. Senate for the TRUE Conservative and Tea-party cause. Just sayin'...
Beltway Republicans say they have learned their lesson. But the tea-party folks and conservatives who vaulted O'Donnell to victory are saying: You had your chance. Now, move aside for new leaders.
Why is the tea party wrong – and the establishment right?
The first tea-party rebellion was the Barry Goldwater movement. When it triumphed at the Cow Palace, Nelson Rockefeller denounced the movement as riddled with radicals, baited the Goldwater people at the convention and refused to endorse the nominee.
A decade later, Vice President Rockefeller got his payback, when conservatives demanded that President Ford drop him off the ticket as the price of renomination. Ford agreed.
In its contemptuous response to O'Donnell's victory, the GOP establishment of today looked like nothing so much as the Rockefeller Republican establishment of yesteryear. Its time is coming, too.
Is the party leadership capable of uniting a governing coalition as Richard Nixon did before Watergate and Ronald Reagan resurrected in the 1980s?
Observing the hysteria and nastiness of Karl Rove and the GOP establishment at the stunning triumph of tea-party princess Christine O'Donnell, the answer is no.
This party is not ready to rule.
Consider. In its grand strategy to recapture a Senate that George W. Bush and Rove lost in 2006, the GOP Senate leadership endorsed all its own caucus members for re-election, if they chose to run, then picked out all its favorite candidates for the open and Democratic seats.
Conservatives and tea-party activists, however, had other ideas. They began to pick their own candidates. And, again and again, the Senate's chosen were rejected in favor of tea-party challengers who had the endorsement of Sarah Palin or South Carolina's Jim DeMint.
Arlen Specter was rejected by the Pennsylvania GOP and left the party. Rand Paul routed Sen. Mitch McConnell's man in Kentucky. Charlie Crist was challenged by Marco Rubio in Florida. Crist, too, departed. Sen. Bob Bennett was denied renomination in Utah. Sen. Lisa Murkowski lost her primary in Alaska to a little-known fellow named Joe Miller.
But Delaware was the stunner. Rep. Mike Castle, a former two-term governor who had been winning elections for 40 years, was a certain victor in November.
Challenger O'Donnell, however, ended all that.
Yet, though her conservative credentials are far superior to those of Castle, O'Donnell was made the object of a wilding attack by National Review and the Weekly Standard, Charles Krauthammer, who lashed out at Palin and DeMint for "irresponsbility," and Rove, who on Sean Hannity's show went postal as soon as the returns came in.
Karl Rove on Sean Hannity, Discussing Christine O'Donnell and 2010 Election
Now, on paper, O'Donnell is a far tougher sell in Delaware than is Castle. But her defeat is not certain. Not in this volatile year.
And what is the justification for the savagery of the attacks on her, from her own?
What has this woman done? Did she vote for Sonia Sotomayor or Elena Kagan for the Supreme Court like Lindsey Graham? Did she support the Obama stimulus like Olympia Snow and Susan Collins? What did she do to deserve the trashing?
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