Lost in Translation

A friend posted this graphic today where certain GOP buzz words were translated into liberal speak. To point to it as an example of the "heightened rhetoric" liberals are always complaining about would no doubt get cries of outrage.

Charming, isn't it? She has a Constitutional right to post those things, but it made me think about what liberals mean when they say certain things.

So, here is my .......

DNC/Liberal Translator

• Radical, Evil - anything I disagree with
• Bigoted, Biased, Racist, Moron, Idiot, Hick, Uneducated Redneck - anyone I disagree with
• Hateful rhetoric - anything you say
• Reality, Truth - anything I say
• Bring down the rhetoric - shut up unless you share my views
• 1st Amendment Rights - I can say whatever I want, you can agree or shut up
• Warmonger - someone who wants to defend out country
• Troops - someone who has been brainwashed into thinking our country is worth defending
• Gay rights - universal, unlimited gay acceptance, regardless of your religious beliefs (you have no right to those)
• Civil Unions - separate but equal, 2nd class citizens (even though this is what they do in Europe and it grants all the same rights as marriage ... it's all about terminology and forced acceptance, not rights, don't ya know)
• Reproductive rights - abortion
• Women's health - abortion
• Access - give it to me free
• Pro-choice - abortion is the only choice
• Constitutional Right - anything I want
• College Students, Grad Students - all-knowing in all things, even if they've never held a job and are supported by their parents
• Occupy Wall Street - non-working people protesting the unfairness that working people have money and they don't, unlimited right to squat (literally and figuratively) in all public parks
• Tea Party - Satan (They believe in fiscal responsibility? OMG!)
• Hypocrites, Intimidators, Self-righteous - Republicans and Christians
• Clergy - see Evil, manipulators, shysters, pedophiles (unless they support Obama)
• Islam - the religion of peace, frequently victimized by Christians and America
• Terrorists - people of strong religious conviction who recognize America is evil and must be destroyed
• Rich - see Evil, people who never pay taxes and made me poor, even if they have worked hard all their live, saved to achieve success, and are philanthropists (except Steve Jobs, he's okay, cuz, you know, iPads and stuff).
• Business - see Evil, heartless work houses that abuse their employees and pay no taxes
• Union employees - victims
• Minorities - victims
• Women - victims .... but we are empowered anyway
• Fair Share, Economic Justice - what I earn is mine, what you earn belongs to the government
• America - see Evil, a country that oppresses the rest of the world (even though it is the most generous country in the world both from a personal and governmental perspective)
• Small government - ignoring hungry children
• Personality responsibility - I'm sorry, what was the question?

I'd love to say this is an exaggeration, but sadly, it's probably not.

Is the President a Whipping Post?

Recently a friend posted a blog opposing the public blame & criticism directed at our President, insisting that it was misplaced as the dysfunctional blame should be on Congress. I got pretty wordy in my reply, so I thought it was time I resurrected this blog.

First of all, our President (and his First Lady) set this hostile tone, in both the 2008 campaign and this administration’s term. The two of them have called us mean and selfish and lazy and racist and dangerous and the list goes on. He should not be surprised we reciprocate. Can you ever remember a time when the President of our country criticized it’s citizens and called them names? Repeatedly? In public? In front of cameras? He is supposed to be our leader, he is supposed to love and cherish our country, not spank success and complain about his lack of power to control things …. particularly since he is the most power man in the world.

Congress is a mess … particularly during President Obama’s first two years when he had Democratic majorities in both houses and every piece of important legislation he wanted was passed. When that legislation didn’t do what he said it would, he blamed the Republicans. Right now we are looking at a Democratic Senate that hasn’t passed a budget in three years. The Republican led House has. President Obama presents budgets so ludicrous even his own party won’t vote for them. He blames the Republicans. The Republican led House has passed 15 different bills to promote job growth. Harry Reid (D) immediately tables them, allowing neither a vote nor discussion. Obama blames the Republicans. The President consistently blames others for his own failures. This does not befit a good leader, a strong leadership, and it makes him look weak to both our allies and our enemies.

In some ways, President Obama has done what he said he would … reformed health care, created a stimulus … and has not accomplished other things …. closing Gitmo, immigration reform. Like all politicians he takes credit for his successes. Sadly, President Obama consistently blames the Republicans for his failures. Also, he also takes credit for things that he did not do … troops are leaving Iraq on President Bush’s agreed upon timeline with the Iraqi government, Osama bin Laden was killed using intel gathered under President Bush that Senator Obama voted against. All Presidents do this, but this assumes Americans are too stupid or too uninterested to remember what he said in the last election or even 15 minutes ago.

All that said, President Obama’s biggest fault is that he has not led. Congress is a mess because he will not lead, and by lead I don’t mean tell them to do what he says then go on vacation. He set the tone his first month in office, “I won, do what I say.” That is not leadership, that is tyranny. He leaves the room, sometimes he doesn’t even enter the room, and he clearly has no concept of what compromise is between opposing political factions. His real work experience was in “community organizing,” which essentially means he bullied businesses into doing what he wanted them to do or minorities would show up in droves to protest their unfair practices. It used to be called a shake down. That is his skill set and he continues to use that in his 24/7 televised blame-o-thon.

Being President is a difficult job, but so is serving in Congress, and Congress during this administration … particularly the Republicans …. get far more blame than they deserve. Obama is not the General of Congress, he is an equal branch of our government and as such should work to reconcile the three branches, not boss them around like they are petulant children. He has proven he believes he is above them all in how he looks down upon and openly & publicly criticizes both Congress and the Supreme Court while making no attempt to mediate or work with them. He then has the chutzpah to complain that it’s easier to rule in China and point at how the founding fathers made his job so hard with that pesky Constitution.

It's difficult to take a whipping post accusation seriously when this is the representation we are getting from our President.

We still live in the greatest, most prosperous, most generous country in the world, no matter how our leaders spit and spat with one another. If we don’t like our representatives, we have the right to replace them. However, if our current President continues to appoint czars and regulating boards and changing the rules to his liking, we may ultimately lose that right. Our founding fathers wrote a brilliant Constitution that has withstood more than 200 years of interpretation. For our own President to criticize them because they didn’t make his job easy is unconscionable to me and an example of his “blame everyone else” leadership.

Overall, I disagree with both vilifying and canonizing our President. I disagreed with it when President Bush was in office, and President Clinton, and Presidents Bush 41 and Reagan as well. However, to hear the mainstream press rail about it, President Obama receives more than hi share, and this is just not true. President Bush received infinitely more criticism and outright hateful vitriol in his last two years (while trying to compromise with a fully Democrat majority Congress) than President Obama has in three years. Calling the President names …. whether it be cowboy, Hitler, warmonger, weak, or socialist … does not advance the causes or reputation of our country. However, our own leader blaming everyone but himself and calling his own citizens names is much more damaging, in my humble opinion. If I were on a GOP Presidential campaign, all my ads would include the long list of names he has called us.

We deserve better and we deserve a better leader.

Jon Stewart & Mocking the Middle

Most of us are tired of the elites and "intellectuals" (including our own representatives) and their constant distain for their fellow Americans. Generally how it goes is that if you aren't liberal, don't vote Democratic, and don't still worship at the altar of Obama, you are somehow intellectually inferior or even defective. This is, of course, hogwash, but the fact that actual verbal attacks on Americans are continuing makes me wonder just what kind of morons we have in Washington. Seriously, they think calling their fellow Americans "backwards" (John Hickenlooper, CO gubernatorial candidate and mayor of Denver) and "enemies" (President Obama) will somehow increase their voter turn out? In a way this is true, voters WILL turn out in records numbers, but not for the reasons these politicians might want.

In the same train of thought, this came from Hugh Hewitt today .....

The Washington Post's Anne Applebaum is worried that Jon Stewart's "rally" in D.C. will turn out badly:

I don't know about you, but my heart sank when I read about Jon Stewart's Million Moderate March, planned for the Mall next weekend. My heart sank further when I learned that liberal groups, lacking any better ideas, have decided to take this endeavor seriously. It's bad enough that the only way to drum up enthusiasm for a "Rally to Restore Sanity" is to make it into a television comedian's joke. But it's far worse that the "moderates" in attendance will have been bused in by Arianna Huffington and organized by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

Stewart's gathering, like Stephen Colbert's "testimony" to Congress last month, is another exercise in mocking middle America --the middle of the country geographically, the middle when it comes to income, the middle when it comes to politics.

It is specifically targeted at the Tea Party, at the hundreds of thousands who turned out at the Beck-Palin rally in September, and at the millions who sympathized with those marching then.

The middle this year is decidely anti-Democratic where it was pro-Obama two years ago. The center of the political spectrum has shifted, and the left now doesn't much like its allies of two years ago, and the result is the venom of some and the condescension of others. Hollywood is divided between the two reactions, but Stewart's overt mocking will go a long way to motivating the center-right's turnout on 11/2.

There is nothing like the contempt of elites to energize anti-elites. The Tea Party owed its creation to Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. It owes thanks for a last push towards next week's victories to all the members of the chattering class who have been so open in their scorn and so thorough in their disdain for ordinary Americans holding traditional opinions on the size and scope of government.

Sincerely,

Hugh Hewitt

Juan Williams, the Muslim Issue, and Political Correctness

This is America, the land of free speech and freedom of religion. Sadly, as indicated by NPR's firing of Juan Williams this week, we are a country who has lost its way in the murky swamp of political correctness. We've all watched it happen over the last three decades, we've all cringed inside at the ridiculousness of it. Yet we've allowed it ... until this week, when our country exploded in indignation over the firing of a good & decent political analyst who told the truth about how so many of us feel every time we are at the airport, or in crowds, or notice something that feels a little off in Times Square. The scars of 9/11 still exist no matter how much we've put a happy face on the event and squash the understandable skittishness we feel about this focused effort to murder us.

The Ground Zero mosque tweaked people. It's simply too close to the target zone, too close to a something which could be used as a victory monument ... not by peaceful Muslims, but by those who wish us all harm. Our mainstream media never pointed out during this controversy that Muslims build a mosque at or near EVERY point of victory. Oh let's not look at that, let's not examine that, it might OFFEND those who want to murder us. Give me a break.

Are all Muslims part of a murdering hoard? Of course not. Then again, neither were all Germans nazis, yet their inaction, their unwillingness to recognize what was going on in their culture, much less call attention to it, contributed to the murder of millions of innocents. When it comes to fluffy, peaceful Muslims, we hear very little from them about what it happening in our world at the hand of their violent brothers.

America has been falsely accused of targeting those fluffy, peaceful Muslims beginning the day after 9/11. But it's a lie. No mosques were burned, no Muslims murdered, and very few harassed in the ten years since 9/11, yet there is this eery fear that any mention that it's Muslims, and only Muslims, murdering people through terrorist attacks in the U.S. and the world will somehow explode into Muslim oppression. Really? I just don't see the evidence. What I do see is a very long list of Muslim extremists blowing us up and very few actually willing to point this out.

Think not? Take this simple quiz:

1. 1968 Bobby Kennedy was shot and killed by:

a. Superman

b. Jay Leno

c. Harry Potter

d. Muslim male between the ages of 17 and 40

2. In 1972 at the Munich Olympics, athletes were kidnapped and massacred by:

a. Olga Corbett

b. Sitting Bull

c. Arnold Schwarzenegger

d. Muslim males mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

3. In 1979, the US embassy in Iran was taken over by:

a. Lost Norwegians

b. Elvis

c. A tour bus full of 80-year-old women

d. Muslim males mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

4. During the 1980′s a number of Americans were kidnapped in Lebanon by:

a. John Dillinger

b. The King of Sweden

c. The Boy Scouts

d. Muslim males mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

5. On May 13th, 1981, Pope John Paul II was shot and critically wounded by:

a. A fish called Wanda

b. Calvin Klein underwear model Markus Shankenberg

c. Juice Newton

d. Muslim male between the ages of 17 and 40

6. In 1983, the US Marine barracks in Beirut was blown up by:

a. A pizza delivery boy

b. Pee Wee Herman

c. Geraldo Rivera

d. Muslim males mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

7. In 1985 the cruise ship Achille Lauro was hijacked and a 70 year old American passenger was murdered and thrown overboard in his wheelchair by:

a. The Smurfs

b. Davey Jones

c. The Little Mermaid

d. Muslim males mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

8. In 1985 TWA flight 847 was hijacked at Athens, and a US Navy diver trying to rescue passengers was murdered by:

a. Captain Kidd

b. Charles Lindberg

c. Mother Teresa

d. Muslim males mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

9. In 1988, Pan Am Flight 103 was bombed by:

a. Scooby Doo

b. The Tooth Fairy

c. The Sundance Kid

d. Muslim males mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

10. In 1993 the World Trade Center was bombed the first time by:

a. Richard Simmons

b. Grandma Moses

c. Michael Jordan

d. Muslim males mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

11. In 1998, the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were bombed by:

a. Mr. Rogers

b. Jasmine Guy

c. The World Wrestling Federation

d. Muslim males mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

12. On 9/11/01, four airliners were hijacked; two were used as missiles to take out the World Trade Centers and of the remaining two, one crashed into the US Pentagon and the other was diverted and crashed by the passengers. Thousands of people were killed by:

a. Bugs Bunny, Wiley E. Coyote, Daffy Duck and Elmer Fudd

b. The Supreme Court of Florida

c. Mr. Bean

d. Muslim males mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

13. In 2002 the United States fought a war in Afghanistan against:

a. Enron

b. The Lutheran Church

c. The NFL

d. Muslim males mostly between the ages of 17 and 40

14. In 2002 reporter Daniel Pearl was kidnapped and murdered by:

a. Bonnie and Clyde

b. Captain Kangaroo

c. Billy Graham

d. Muslim males mostly between the ages of 17 and 40.

15. In 2009, 31 people wounded and 13 American Soldiers murdered on base at Fort Hood by:

a. The last surviving male Solid Gold dancer

b. Dr. Girlfriend

c. Willow Rosenberg

d. Muslim male between the ages of 17 and 4015.

16. On May 1st 2010, a crude car bomb made from gasoline, propane, fireworks, and alarm clocks was rigged to explode in Times Square by:

a. Sigmund the Sea Monster

b. Fran Eaton, Editor of the Illinois Review

c. Mumm-Ra the Everliving

d. Muslim male between the ages of 17 and 40

Nope, no pattern here! Just misunderstood Muslims ... don't dare look at those who believe in this "religion of peace" with any kind of suspicion or doubt. That would be RAAAAAACIST.

So, to ensure we Americans never offend anyone, particularly fanatics intent on killing us, airport security screeners can’t profile Muslims — even though Muslims are the ones mass murdering people using America’s PC-obsession against us. In airports, TSA must conduct random searches of 80-year-old women, little kids, airline pilots with proper identification, secret agents who are members of the President’s security detail, 85-year old Congressmen with metal hips, and Medal of Honor winner and former Governor Joe Foss, but leave Muslim Males between the ages 17 and 40 alone lest they be guilty of profiling.

Political correctness is killing us, and we are too worried about offending someone to protect ourselves or even talk about it.

Thank you Juan Williams and Bill O'Reilly for pulling back the curtain in Oz and making us look at who is hiding back there.

"Let them eat cake" - How our First Lady will contribute to President Obama's losses in 2010 and 2012

Great article by Austin Hill in today's Town Hall, Barack, Michelle, Champaign Wishes and Caviar Dreams, pointing out the disparity of what our "monarchs" are doing versus what they are saying. The parties, the trips, etc. these things are sticking in the craw of most Americans, especially those out of work. We are ALL paying for their lavish Wednesday night parties and the never-ending stream of vacations.

Michelle Obama's current trip to Spain is the most recent fiasco. As her husband has spent 18 months (plus some campaign time) telling us all to tighten our belts, his wife has used her position as First Lady not to do public service, but to live high on the hog. She exemplifies "do as I say, not as I do," which couldn't be anymore obvious than when she proclaimed that Americans should flock to the Gulf Coast to help their tourist industry then promptly went to the coast of Maine with her family on vacation. HUH?

Two weeks later she's living it up in Spain, with a personal entourage of 40 (also being paid for by us), plus the necessary Secret Service and security forces, in a $3,000/night luxury hotel. Mind you, this is not an official visit. She's not actually DOING anything to represent our country or working! Nope, this is vacation time for her and her daughter. I guest she needs a break after all that vacationing in Maine and her 15 minutes at the Gulf Coast.

There is more than a disconnect going on here. They (her in particular) show a complete disregard for what Americans are dealing with as they jet set off to where they wish to go for whatever reason ... including flying the family dog on it's own private plane. Seriously, can you imagine the outcry if the Bushes had done that? The media complained incessantly about President Bush going to Camp David and his own ranch!

President Obama gleefully blames the Bush Administration for the financial woes of the country (nevermind that it was the Democratic Congress that made the last four years a financial disaster area), but he and Michelle clearly learned nothing from the Bushes as far as grace and consideration of the people of America who pay for their livelihood and their extravagances.

Did you know, for example, that through the four years of Bush 41 and the eight years of Bush 43, every Christmas was spent at Camp David? Do you know why? Camp David has a 24/7 in house staff and security. They all live there year round. By going to Camp David, the Bushes allowed their Washington staff and Secret Service to spend the holidays with their families instead of taking them away to, say, Hawaii. When the Bushes went on vacation, they went to the ranch in Crawford, where they had no staff, did things for themselves, and limited the number of security personal who had to accompany them. Whenever Laura Bush or Hillary Clinton went abroad, it was always for state business, not to lounge around on the beach in Spain, while Secret Service cleared said beach of all the other tourists in Spain for them to do so.

When Mrs. Bush traveled for recreation, she went to national parks ... thereby supporting not only the local economy but also bringing attention to our wonderful park system. She visited with school children and represented our President and our country well. ((nice examples here: Laura Bush urges support for national parks and Laura Bush stays on message)). Because of her love of national parks, Mrs. Bush was asked to be honorary chairwoman of the National Park Foundation. Compare that to President Obama, honorary president of the Boy Scouts of America, shunning the 100th Anniversary of the Boy Scouts and their jamboree where 45,000 boy scouts received a pre-recorded video greeting from the President, who was too busy campaigning for Democratic candidates and appearing on The View to attend their celebration. Lack of consideration of others appears to be an ongoing theme of this Presidency.

These people simply do not get it. They are not royalty. They are servants to the people. President Obama was elected to lead, not so that he and his family could give parties and take expensive vacations on our dime. In normal economic circumstances this would be unacceptable, under the current financial crisis it is inexcusable. And they should both remember that in November and 2012 when voters loudly shout "off with their heads."

Lies & their derivatives

When did lying become the dominant political default position? That is followed with lying about the lie by calling it a misstatement or an oversight. Then it’s all ignored by the media and the entire country is expected to play this ignorance game as if we can’t see the lies staring us in the face.

This has become a systemic problem in this White House, beginning with the Stimulus Package.

The Stimulus Package has been a boondoggle. The economy has leveled out a little, but honestly it has been more in spite of the stimulus not because of it. The economy would have righted itself had it not been meddled with, but piling on debt from the stimulus looks like someone is doing something. It didn’t matter if it was the right thing.

The few jobs created came at a $500,000 each price tag. Few if any jobs were created in the private sector that is still hemorrhaging. Nothing about this Stimulus Pkg has done what was promised. Yet, the Obama administration keeps declaring victory by saying, “It could have been worse.” Really? No doubt that is true. However, this administration continues to claim superior intelligence and Nobel prizes know everything. Yet they seem to miss the fact that the 9.7% unemployment rate is not below 8%. Continuing to tell the American people “it could be worse” does not counteract the fact that they had no idea what they were doing and shoved this bill down the people’s throat and pretend it’s working. It’s not. IT IS A LIE.

Now, they’ve done it again with the new financial package that is supposed to prevent another bail out crisis. However, the leading banner-carrier for this legislation publicly stated that they won’t know if it works until we have another crisis. HUH? Talk about a circular argument. They have no idea what this financial package will do, who it will hurt, or what the collateral damage might be, yet they pat themselves on the back because their computer models tell them it will be great, even if it isn’t. IT IS A LIE.

Thus is the “logic” of the Obama Administration. Let’s try theories and computer models and inflict risky financial legislation onto American business and Americans. Then let’s watch to see what happens. I mean, they could look at our country’s history and previous economic woes and see that universally the one common thread that helped the economy recover has always been tax cuts. If you cut taxes there are more funds in Americans’ pockets to spend, which in turn creates jobs, which then produces more tax revenue. Taking money away from taxpayers prevents them from spending, causes unemployment, and ultimately causes serious economic problems. This happens every time taxes are raised. Every time. Yet they prefer to say government is the only way to save our economy. IT IS A LIE.

Let's move to health care. The debate droned on for almost a year. The key selling points to Democrats was that it would save money and reduce the debt and lower costs for American families. Low and behold, six months after the bill passed, the CBO (Congressional Budget Office) releases its updated figures. Not only will this program not save money, it will add to the deficit and substantially increase the costs to American families. Rather than re-examine the financial manipulation or even the practicality of this broad, damaging legislation, the Obama Administration pretends there is no difference, as if the financial damage to our country won't really occur. IT IS A LIE.

For a different kind of lie, just this week, Ken Salazar, former Colorado Senator and now the (completely inept) Secretary of the Interior, LIED and doctored reports on offshore drilling insisting that experts said drilling should be shut down. Said experts cried foul. They did not say that and, in fact, they said the opposite, that stopping drilling was not required and would damage the Gulf economy further. Salazar ignored that, the mainstream media ignored that, and President Obama ignored that, continuing to insist the drilling must be stopped according to experts. The drilling has now stopped and oil rigs are moving to other countries, further devastating the Gulf Coast economy. This is not a misstatement, miscalculation, or difference of interpretation. IT IS A LIE.

While we are on Salazar, last week, he defended pulling 77 oil lease contracts granted in the final days of the George W. Bush administration. Salazar's own inspector general concluded that there was no evidence of any rush to auction off the parcels -- as Salazar claimed. In fact, the leases were granted only after seven full years of rigorous study and debate. Leases have been pulled anyway. Again, this is not a misinterpretation. IT IS A LIE. This is a little thing, but in the U.S. struggle to be energy efficient and the continuing insistence by the Obama administration that they know more and know better than experts and the American people, this counts. A lot.

My favorite lie of the week has been over this Sherrod affair. Andrew Breitbart was set up. He was sent a doctored video and he went with it. His bad, he should have followed up and asked to see the entire video, but he didn’t, and neither did Fox News, the NAACP, or the Obama Administration. The interesting thing is that Fox News is being blamed for this woman’s dismissal. She was told on the phone to resign because she was going to be “on Glenn Beck” that night. Except that she wasn’t. LIE. Beck didn’t even talk about her. In fact, Beck’s first mention of her was the following day when he took her side and insisted the context should be examined before any steps were taken. The first Fox Report about her was Bill O’Reilly who has already apologized for not doing his own homework and checking the context. But O’Reilly’s report was at least an hour after Ms Sherrod had resigned. No one, no one on Fox mentioned Ms Sherrod until after she had resigned/was fired. So how could they be responsible for it? Of course, that isn’t stopping the NAACP, the Obama Administration, nor Ms Sherrod from accusing Fox of this fiasco. Again. IT IS A LIE.

This administration has become a joke of lies, manipulation (typically of its own party), and misdirection. All this discussion about racism and Ms Sherrod is ridiculous chatter usurping the news cycles and keeping Americans from focusing on the important stuff … unemployment, the economy and joblessness.

Need one more lie? Just a little one. Remember how President Obama insisted he “would not rest” until the Gulf oil spill was stopped and cleaned up? Then he went to play golf, and on three vacations, and singing with Paul McCartney at the White House (and a party there every Wednesday since). IT IS A LIE. But you already knew that.

Source material, Michelle Malkin's article today, "The Democrats War on the West."

Ann Coulter - Obama's numbers are down, imaginary racism is up

I love Ann Coulter. She's brash, direct, doesn't mince words, says what she thinks, mocks the ridiculous. Liberal political equivalents (Rachel Maddow, Keith Olbermann) are called journalists, she is called a bitch. You do the math.

Most of all, I like Coulter because she makes me laugh. She doesn't take herself, or anyone else, too seriously, and lays out her opinions and jibes like dishes at a church pot luck. I particularly like the first paragraph of her column today where she proudly and accurately proclaims:

The Democrats are depressed about their collapsing poll numbers, so it's time to start calling conservatives 'racist.'"

It does seem to work that way these days, doesn't it. think about it.

Article: Obama's Poll Numbers Down, Imaginary Racism Up