Will we look back on the President’s first address to the nation as Commander-in-Chief as just another Democratic party cut-and-run?

*["HinzSight" reference is a tribute to the loss of a great journalist, athlete and friend of DeVine Law Gamecock, David Hinz, who was killed in a traffic accident this past Thanksgiving weekend. Our obituary is here, with other tributes at The Minority Report (which company merged with Dave's original HinzSight Report) and Many Faces of Barack). Dave's journalistic love was of foreign affairs and the war on terror, and so we will use the HinzSight nomenclature from time to time to categorize some of our writing and as a tribute to our dear friend.]

Since JFK’s death in 1963, no Democratic Party president has been feared by enemies of the United States and the party seems to go out of its way to lose wars and betray allies.

From the 1975 congressional Democrat majority betrayal of the Hmong, thru Carter’s 1979 betrayal of the Shah of Iran; thru John Kerry’s open collusion with Nicaraguan communists and Ted Kennedy’s secret alliance with Gorbachev against U.S. missiles in Europe and for the nuclear freeze in the 1980s; thru Clinton’s cut and run in Somalia, law enforcement approach to the 1993 WTC bombing thru the feckless bombing of night watchman after the African embassy act of war bombings in the late 90s; and thru the “Bushlied Era” of the mid-2000 decade, the Democratic Party has been all about exuding aggression inviting weakness to enemies abroad.

Now comes Barack Obama after:

1. A campaign echoing the Democratic Party (fake warmongering) mantra that Afghanistan is the “good war” of necessity (as opposed to that war of “choice” in Iraq, that most all the Dems voted for with the same intel Clinton and Bush had, but I digress);
2. A March 2009 declaration that the Afghan War had to be won with a directive to General McChrystal to come up with a strategy; and finally,
3. After retreating from the strategy presented by his generals and a scare from his left on health care and the 2009 election disaster, with a Tuesday evening prime time speech to the nation now wanting to “finish the job” in Afghanistan.

For the record, neither DeVine Law Gamecock, nor Cockstradamus ever believed any of the Elected to serve in D.C. Democrats not named Lieberman, ever were all in for victory in Afghanistan after the first 72 hours, but only used the mantra to separate themselves from Bush and the Iraq War. Bob Shrum admitted this.

We didn’t need an admission to know that Democrats haven’t the stomach nor the smarts to win wars.

President Obama has left the troops hanging for a year as he has continued to blame Bush for “drift”, despite the fact that they adopted the Bush strategy and yet have not implemented it during their 11 months in office.

Now we are told that since Obama will request and deploy 39,000 troops that he is “essentially” meeting McChrystal’s request? Huh?

General McChrystal requested 80,000 troops and “no less than 40,000″.

It looks like what Obama has “essentially” done is slap this fine warrior down in public again (40K-1K=39K), much as his administration has been doing since the 80,000 request was made public weeks ago. Or has it been months ago!

Afghanistan is not Iraq

I have said since soon after 911 and even more so after the invasion of Iraq, that I favored the Rumsfeld small footprint strategies, especially in Afghanistan given its tribal nature, geography and history of large footprint failures by the UK and USSR. The only defeat of the Russian army in history was in Afghanistan.

Yes, let us kill all the Taliban and al Qaida that we can; remove the safe nation-state haven; keep troops enough to prevent all but deadly havens for al Qaida and the Taliban; give the Afghans (90% of whom loathe the Taliban and al Qaida) a chance at a republic; and keep watch over Iran and Pakistan.

This is not Iraq sitting on vast oil reserves in Persian Gulf. I was for the surge after the necessary stay the course so we could get intel for a surge. I was for making Iraq into Connecticut, which it essentially is now. Pray God don’t let Democrat Obama snatch defeat from victory in Iraq like his counterparts did in Vietnam.

But Afghanistan is not Iraq, and so I am receptive to a lesser surge strategy that mainly keeps the country from becoming a safe haven for launching attacks on the US and keeps troops close to Iran and Pakistan for deterrence and rapid response reasons.

Dems like to end, not win wars

But when I hear a Democrat President that has never acknowledged the great victory in Iraq, speak of “ending” the war in Afghanistan; and of not wanting to “hand off” Afghanistan to a successor, I hear that familiar limp-wristed Democrat loser refrain that sounds like fingernails scratching a chalkboard. Specifically, this statement:

“My preference would be not to hand off anything to the next president.”

Kind of like Clinton didn’t “hand off” anything on Somalia and Afghanistan? Usually when Democrats speak of no handoff, they mean that they have already lost the last war, with no mention of the ones they make inevitable.

These people giggled when Ronaldus Magnus called the Soviet empire, evil.

This is what we are dealing with, but, I am an American and Barack Obama is my President and the ONLY Commander-in-Chief we have. If a strategy is to succeed in foreign affairs, it will be Obama’s and no other.

And, like I said, I am receptive to a less than Connecticut strategy there. But it is essential that we not betray our freedom loving allies and that we are not SEEN as cutting and running.

Obama’s apology tours give me no solace that he doesn’t WANT us to be seen as cowardly losers, but maybe Election Day 2009 concentrated his mind to understand that at least for the next 3 years, HE IS AMERICA and maybe his manhood will insist that he be feared.

I just hope that a few years down the road, we can say in HinzSight* that Obama did right by our troops and this nation’s national security.

Mike DeVine’s Charlotte Observer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Minority Report columns

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

Originally published @ Examiner.com, where all verification links may be accessed.

The first time I moved to Atlanta was in 2001 after losing my father, best friend and pastor in South Carolina. Now, three months after moving back, this time from North Carolina after a 30 month absence, I lose one the best friends I never met.

Dave Hinz and several other close friends I made on-line over the years, beginning at Redstate.com, helped to fill part of the void even though we never met face-to-face. I don’t like to leave the house, you see, unless I just have to.

After yesterday’s tragic loss of my good friend, I never will see Dave in the flesh, but am thankful that I got to know him so well and learned so much from him via telephone, email and the web. God surely sent Hinz my way to help guide the DeVine dinosaur (He always forded me to make technological leaps, as he said, beyond communication via smoke signals through Tweets!) in his new Atlanta, 21st Century life.

My first Redstate memories of Dave was as a life-long conservative who brought a more mature and grounded perspective to this rabid right wing convert.

My next memory was when this professionally trained journalist asked me to join him and a few others to start The HinzSight Report. I was humbled and honored and credit much of my ability to market myself to major newspapers since then, to the experience of being edited by Dave as well as the confidence his choice of me as Legal Editor, imbued.

I remember Dave sharing his new terrorism novel for me to read. No, God help us, not for Gamecock chicken scratch to proofread! Dave was the proofreader and substance. But he just wanted to see if I liked it because he knows that if I didn’t, I would say so.

It was good. I liked it. Dave was a real writer, not just an opinion hocker like me.

Dave was good at whatever he decided to do. I’m sure he was the best Fedex had to offer, and Dave was an Olympic-calibre track and field athlete and prolific cyclist.

But Dave’s passion was to turn his “citizen journalism” idea into a Drudge Report equivalent, only with more substance. I guess Dave mistrusted the Drive-by media even more than I, but he wanted to do more about it, and with the new 73wire.com venture it looked like his dream was becoming reality before our eyes.

My last communication to Dave was a “tweet” in which I stated that I had made 73wire one of my must reads several times a day to look at what headlines Dave and his partner at the new sight as well as TMR and MFOB, Steve Foley and the staff deemed important. I trust their judgment.

Now, two days on, and after two attempts to define the most American of holidays, the real meaning of Thanksgiving slaps the rooster in the face:

I am thankful for having friends like Dave Hinz. I miss you already buddy. Thanks for indulging this hot and cold Southern Fried Gamecock, and for gosh sakes, now you can have some of that good Eastern North Carlina Bar-be-que up there, that you came to love when you lived down in the Tar Heel State! Pork, not chicken or beef (You know the drill…)!

And Gamecock will be pulling for the Central Michigan Chippewas on College Football Saturdays, equally, right along with my USC and Ramblin’ Wreck from Georgia Tech, from now on!

God bless Dave Hinz and his family and loved ones.

Mike DeVine’s Charlotte Observer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Minority Report columns

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

Originally published @ TMR’s The HinzSight Report.

From Steve Foley at The Minority Report

It’s with the heaviest of hearts that I inform you that my friend and online partner David Hinz was killed this morning in a auto accident. I don’t have all the details right now but the weather was bad and black ice was most likely what caused the accident.

Dave was on his way to work, at Fed Ex, when it happened.

A consummate warrior for freedom and liberty Dave was not only a brilliant writer and seeker of truth… he was someone I was proud to call my friend.

I’m obviously devastated by this news today… so I promise to give you more details and properly eulogize my friend in the coming days.

Please keep his family in your prayers!

Steven Foley

I join with Steve and all of Dave’s friends in mourning this great loss of a very close and dear friend.

Mike DeVine

Gamecock just announced the dawning of the first Black Friday in his memory that won’t be black and Cockstradamus crows at the dawning of the feared double-dip recession; but JimmyCrackCorn and ObamaDems don’t care.

Red Friday I

DeVine Law won’t be in the North American shopping mall equivalent of the Running of the Bulls today, but he never is nor will be. His three main goals in life are to never get hot; never be forced to speak to a Police between Dusk and Dawn; and never, ever go to a shopping mall (Drug stores on Christmas Eve have plenty of presents to choose from, but I digress.)

But now that Thanksgiving Day 2009 (brought to you by Pilgrims, Washington, Lincoln and God) is over, can we get serious about how much more we would like to be thankful for on Thanksgiving Day 2010 so that Black Friday 2010 has a darker hue than today’s in the red one?

Character Test

We spoke last year of being tested as a people no matter whether Obama or McCain prevailed, given the loss of so much housing and other wealth and given the state of debt held by individuals and government.

The test was going to be bad enough without a government, at one hostile to the Liberty that leads to wealth creation and enamored of economic-crisis driven blank checks for government growthulus.

Porkulus is more caring than Govenment Growthulus

Then we were served up a Dems Don’t Care about the poor and middle class non-Stimulus better characterized as Government Growthulus, not the more ubiquitous epithet of “porkulus.”

Cockstradamus laughed on January 13th of this year when Hugh Hewitt’s wide-eyed economic optimist Brian Wesbury announced the “most intense” period of the recession behind us. We hope that HH. BW and Larry Kudlow-ites have enjoyed moving the shells of the Dow Jones game around as they have followed the wave of deficit spending on saved and created pencil-pushing state, local and federal government jobs as well as Bernanke’s assault on the once Almighty Dollar. Hope that 2.8% downward revised GDP in the Third Quarter warmed your soul for the intensity of accumulated long-term unemployment that will make January 2009 look like salad days even to Wesburyites, as they read CBO Director Doug Elmendorf:

CBO Director Elmendorf said today the country has not yet seen the worst of joblessness, despite some encouraging signs of economic growth.

Speaking at the American Association for Budget and Program Analysis’ fall conference, Elmendorf said the CBO projection of this past summer, which saw the unemployment rate peaking at 10.5 percent next year, underestimated the autumn’s rise in jobless numbers. The rate hit 10.2 percent in October.

“We are weighing our precise forecast going forward,” Elmendorf said, adding that the employment picture is expected to get worse before it gets better.

CBO has forecast that it will take years before unemployment falls to a “sustainable” level of 5 percent, Elmendorf said, because the current jobless numbers are so high.

“If one judges the pain of a recession by the excess of the unemployment rate over the long-run level … this picture is very clear that most of the pain of the recession is ahead of us, not behind us,” he said.

All things Stimulus

Stimulus I consisted of several parts:

a) safety-net unemployment and COBRA health insurance for the truly needy;
b) one-time, approx. $400 individual tax cuts for incomes under $250K;
c) public works pork; and
d) Government Growthulus increases in the federal bureaucracy and aid to states, who used them to retain government employees.

Ford has a better idea

Ford Motor Company and many other non-bailed out companies have so far weathered the creative destruction of this Great Recession to post profits with less employees. But never let government have to do that. We all know we need every last school administrator backing up the lowly teachers.

COBRA

But, Gamecock favored the extensions of unemployment and COBRA and favors even further extensions now. Unemployment comp has been extended, but I urge all to support H.R. 3930, introduced by Rep. Joe Sestak, D-Pa., on extending COBRA.

We also favored a massive public works program to put people to work IN 2009! But instead, we got a puny public works program that mainly printed signs in 2009 with most all of the tiny budget for public works to be spent in the few months before Election 2010, so that voters see a shovel beside a “This project funded by the Recovery Act” sign.

ObamaDems don’t care about the poor

ObamaDems didn’t care about the suffering of the 10-17% unemployed in 2009 and the first half of 2010. They do care about getting re-elected and hope they have made enough of the unemployed victim dependents by next Election day.

I only wish Stimulus I had served up more pork, as we await the likely servings of no better than Tofu with the Jobs Summit and Stimulus II.

Yes, I would love for a real stimulus to come out of Obama’s December Jobs Summit and that it be called Stimulus II, or even, Barack Obama We Love you II, if it were a real stimulus.

While I don’t share the optimism of Rush Limbaugh and others that even the supply-side tax and regulation cuts that have always worked in the past (see 1920s, 1960s and 1983-2006) would work as quickly as in the past, until we start laying the foundation for wealth and job creation, we are simply prolonging suffering unnecessarily.

Or is the suffering necessary?

Maybe it is necessary that we suffer so that our minds are concentrated on the hideous results of Big Government and failed liberal Democratic Party policies.

Democrats took over the House and Senate in January 2007. The Great recession started in December 2007, nine months before the credit crunch. The repeal of Bush Republican policies on taxes and regulations is the reason, even before the Dems’ Fannie Mae protection plan via Senate filibusters took hold.

Is it possible that fears of a massive Gingrich-like 1994 repeat could get ObamaDems to rethink the spread the wealth already accumulated strategy and actually enact policies that would encourage, rather than demonize private sector job and wealth creation?

I doubt it, but if we are to have more to be thankful for next year, the Reagan, JFK, Coolidge way is the only way.

Savings are key to future growth

But one other way will also be a necessary part of any recovery, and that will be the way the author of Thanksgiving set out in his Holy Bible, and that will be to build houses on solid rock rather than sand and to store up goods for rainy days.

The fact is that Obama can push housing tax credits (and I favor them); small business loan subsidies (and I favor them), but until people save up money that makes them feel secure enough to risk money on a business and until lenders see the likelihood of profits being earned from new loans, there won’t be any real, REAL job producing loans. Instead, all we will get are the next moves towards the next bubbles.

Want to have a more stimulating 2010 with more to be thankful for on the last Thursday in November and really, really Black Friday?

Dare ObamaDems

Dare Blue Dawgs to vote for any health care bill that doesn’t end state monopolies and enact federal tort reform. Dare them to pass an energy tax assault on the poor and middle class cap and trade. Dare them lest we cap them and trade them in for Republicans that won’t make Pelosi and Reid sycophants for ObamaDems and JimmyCrackCorn, because them don’t care.

We do remain thankful for God’s Providence, especially including Obama’s inexperience. Can you imagine the threadbare clothing we would be in crisis over if the Obama Administration were actually competent?

We are also very thankful for the good work that Rush Limbaugh (no thanks to Newt) has done over the years in exposing the hoax of man-made global warming, which forms the latest basis for post-Berlin Wall socialists to tear down Liberty and the wealth it produces that makes us lemmings less dependent on Obamas.

Yet, even in the face of the exposed hoax, President Obama is going to Copenhagen to vow the continues assault on American Tiny Tims this winter.

The Ghosts of Christmas past, present and future await Scrooge in 2010 and 2012.

Mike DeVine’s Charlotte Observer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Minority Report columns

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

Originally published @ Examiner.com, where all verification links may be accessed.

We thank God first for his providence and benefits, much as our first President did more than 220 years ago:

Whereas it is the duty of all Nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor… – President George Washington, October 3, 1789

Braves-Gamecock will do his duty, as Cockstradamus and Foghorn Leghorn do theirs by first thanking God for sending his son, Jesus Christ to become flesh among us, so that we might become sons of God:

We thank God for the men and women of the Armed Forces of the United States for putting their lives on the line for us and for keeping us safe since last Thanksgiving Day;

We are truly thankful for the employment of nearly 90% of Americans and that the Fruited Plain is still so bountiful that the “poor” can still attain obesity status (Foghorn Leghorn is not passing on the gravy!);

I am especially thankful to be back in my adopted Atlanta hometown and Capitol of Dixie where the Ramblin’ Wreck from Georgia Tech are hecks of engineers whose Yellow Jackets have stung 10 of 11 opponents en route to the ACC Championship Game after facing Them Dawgs from Athens;

Also thankful for my Wofford and USC Law School alma maters are mainly academic schools (can’t you tell?) after woeful football seasons, but we relish the Terrier basketball victory the Georgia Bulldogs and hope for a University of South Carolina Fighting Gamecocks chickin’ lickin’ over Clemson’s Tigers at Williams-Brice in Columbia this Saturday;

Foghorn Leghorn is especially thankful for the power of Talk Radio, and most especially El Rushbo, for cutting through the fog of the Drive-by Media and ObamaDems on the:

Non-stimulus, government growthulus bill that has helped to reduce the credibility of the ObamaDems so much that they have been unable to push through socialized medicine…yet;

Socialist-manned, enemy of capitalism, government grant-driven hoax and fraud of man-made global warming/climate change that has, so far, prevented the Senate form passing the huge tax assault on the poor and middle class called Cap-and-Trade; and

Ken-doll image of Barack Hussein Obama to reveal to more and more Independents the visage of Hate-America Church Rev Wright and Terrorist Bill Ayers;

Cockstradamus is especially thankful for all the Taliban, al Qaeda and other terrorists our armed forces in Iraq, and especially Afghanistan this hour, that our military has killed as it appears the Commander-in-Chief wants to “finish the job” there and not “have to hand it” off to a successor.

Cockstradamus (pictured left) is advised by former Democrat, DeVine Law (pictured below), that when liberal Democrats since 1963 speak of wanting to finish (not win) wars, they intend to lose them. They think that if you pull troops out, then you hand over nothing to your successor. Like when President George W. Bush was handed off no recession (that his tax cuts fixed btw, but I digress) or terrorism problem in 2000?

But we can all be thankful that, since we don’t expect an Obama “exit strategy” (again, this is liberal Democrat-speak for lose the war) to be for more than three years, it appears that President Obama expects to be sitting during the 2013 Inaugural.

We are thankful for the manifest, irrefutable evidence of the maturity of the American people on the issue of race last Inauguration Day, but are even more thankful that John McCain won’t have to suffer the rigors of running another martyrdom lose the Presidency campaign while looking the other way while his employees defame a fine conservative woman in 2012.

Thanks must be given for the likelihood of the re-education of Americans as to the dangers of repeating failed liberal democrat economic policies given the depths of this Great Recession. It is best that reality muggings take place earlier for da yutes.

We must thank Almighty God for the wisdom of the founders of this Shining City on a Hill and  for the Framers of its Constitution.

Thank you God.

Mike DeVine’s Charlotte Observer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Minority Report columns

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

Before disabusing readers of Drive-By Media-driven notions that moderate Democrats and extremist Republicans actually exist [portions of this column originally appeared as, generally, "Moderate Democrats and Extremist Republicans don't exist" at Modern Conservative, as well as Examiner.com and here at Redstate.com] in the modern world, let this Gamecock’s announcement of his Modern Conservative dawn (debut) also crow of what modernized this former liberal Democrat into a proud Reaganite.

DeVine Law will conclude with suggestions of how social conservatives and libertarians must strongly ally themselves to prevent the de-modernization of these United States.

Pre-modern conservatives lost elections

From the 1950s debut of William F. Buckley‘s National Review magazine and Whittaker Chambers‘ publication of his ”Witness” autobiography; through the Barry Goldwater and Gerald Ford defeats in the 60s and 70s, the only Republican bright spots were Richard Nixon‘s electoral victories, which were basically devoid of any conservative policy triumphs.

The most conservative events before the 1981 Dawn of the Modern Conservative Era, were President John F. Kennedy‘s recovery-inducing supply-side income tax rate cuts and blockade of Russian missile-laden Cuba.

Fortunately, America was able to survive and prosper in the pre-modern era due to many shared conservative values among the members of both, then moderate, parties. That circumstance basically ended when Lee Harvey Oswald‘s magic bullets found their mark in 1963.

The left took over the world’s oldest political party while the still-moderate Grand Old Party eventually secured tennis court passes from Speaker Tip O’Neil, but were unable to prevent the betrayal of the Hmong, South Vietnamese and the kicking of the black man out the house so Uncle Sam could be daddy.

Then came Reagan, Newt and Rush

Modern conservatism has incorporated all, and I mean all, that was good about classic liberalism, whether it be President Ronald Reagan‘s acceptance of the “safety net for the truly needy”; Martin Luther King’s content of character mantle; or the liberty to retain most of the fruits of one’s labor so as to maximize happiness pursuits.

Unapologetic and unabashed conservatism wins every time it’s tried. I know, for, as a county chairman, delegate, and activist in the Democratic Party during the 80s and 90s, I waved good-bye to national security, pro-life democrats wracked by the failed policies of the filibuster-proof Democratic Party majority James Earl Carter years, as they joined the Gipper and saved America and the World from inflation-caused economic disaster and the Red menace.

But it wouldn’t be until my 2001 move from trial lawyer to corporate work/column writing and from Spartanburg to Atlanta that my conservative epiphany would be made manifest.

After 5000 years, conservatives have reached some conclusions

Unshackled by the parochial concerns in my hometown, and educated for 12 years by Rush Limbaugh’s EIB network, this former JFK Democrat proclaimed himself a Modern Conservative before September 11, 2001. After all, I had:

• Always called the Soviet empire, evil;
• Experienced the fruits of supply-side throughout the Reagan recovery, including the Newt-induced continuation during the Clinton years; and was
• Repulsed by the Borking of Judges Robert and Clarence.

I eschewed the failed policies of Democrats from 1964-2000, including those of President Bill Clinton before the 1994 Rush/Gingrich revolution; was repelled by merely bombing Afghanistan night watchmen after the 1998 African embassy bombings while seducing near-minor interns; and favored George W. Bush’s tax cuts to McCain’s crooked-talk and Gore’s multiple personalities.

One of my favorite quotes of William F. Buckley from his Firing Line PBS talk show, was that one of the main differences between liberals and conservatives is that “after 5000 years of human history, conservatives have reached some conclusions.”

After 38 years, DeVine Law reached those same conclusions.

Then came the ObamaDem assault on all things exceptional about America

I, like Charles Krauthammer in the latest National Review cover story (dead-tree magazine only), don’t mind self-identifying as a “neo-con”, given my support for a robust and aggressive foreign policy that liberates Grenadas and makes Iraqs into Connecticuts after removing evil regimes that threaten American security. I see national security conservative as a synonymous label.

I usually self-identify as a social conservative, though, due to the ubiquity of false stereotypes in the media and even within the conservative movement, and because this country was founded upon Judeo-Christian values that are under assault, and have been since the 60s.

But in truth, conservatism is most aptly defined economically by a preference for as small a government as we can stand, for whenever we hand over responsibilities to the government, we necessarily give up a portion of our Liberty.

Conservatives and Americans of all stripes that still share a love of Liberty and a belief in American exceptionalism, now face an unprecedented threat to our liberty that requires that we all ally ourselves electorally behind a force that can not just arrest the advance of ObamaDem socialism (much as Reagan with Boll weevils and Newt with a triangulator), but that can REVERSE it.

For that one must coalesce in ONE PARTY in a filibuster-proof Senate, strong majority House of Representatives and the White House. It begins in Election 2010.

The loss of Liberty will not be reversed by a third party nor by a coalition of Republicans and Blue Dawg Democrats

You dreamers of a new third-party GOP rising from Whig ashes, wake up. Ain’t gonna happen.

Dreamers that Blue Dawgs in the Senate (There is only 1-8 real blue dawgs in the joke of a House, so we skip it.) will continue to protect us from high energy taxes via Cap and Trade and a Public Option, wake up.

For ObamaDems and Bernankes that are destroying the U.S. dollar with trillions in non-stimuli (that passed the blue dawg House and Senate btw) as we speak, don’t you know the lessons of Louisiana (Landriue) Purchase II, will not be lost on Nelsons, Bayhs and Lincolns. Start the bidding at $300M.

And abortions will be banned to give some dems cover. But don’t worry, you can count on one hand, the number of abortions that won’t happen because of that. Its a non-issue the dems will use to get socialism writ large as we all thank God that “only” 49,000,000 more abortions will be had in the next 26 years as since 1973′s Roe v. Wade, rather than the 49,000,004 that would be had if government paid for them. Not even enough lives saved to put 5 basketball players on the court, but I digress.

But what of Independent Democrat Senator Joe ‘don’t need no stinkin’ public option’ Lieberman? The ObamaDems will find nomenclature and devices to satisfy Joe. I hope he proves me wrong, and I certainly admire his career-long hawkish national security defense stances and his moral voice against Bill Clinton, but somehow I think a provision protecting the insurance industry (See stronger mandate threats of imprisonment if you don’t get the Colonial Life rider?) will be inserted that will re-write what “public” and “options” mean in Merriam-Webster.

Bottom line: We face permanent deconstruction of America if WE THE PEOPLE don’t reverse, and I mean REVERSE (not just stop further advances) the policies put in place by ObamaDems before the 2010 election.

The GOP is the ONLY vehicle to save America short of a Revolution

And given the action against the Navy Seals and the KSM trial, I think the ObamaDems are perfectly capable of instigating a revolution. In fact, one could argue that Obama already fired on Fort Sumter equivalents.

I said all the above, in part, to say this to my social conservative friends

In some cases, in order to win super, filibuster-proof majorities in Congress, we will have to support economic conservatives that are libertarian on social issues. Do the math.

But not to worry, most social policy is made at the state and local level or the courts, and as of now, we have a 5-4 majority on most social issues. Yes, on abortion, we need another vote, but let’s cross that bridge in 2012 by retaining the pro-life plank, pro-traditional marriage plank, federalism advocacy; and nominate only a pro-life presidential nominee.

But conservatives can re-take the GOP only with libertarian help, and an appeal to federalism is the ticket to satisfy both sides. I don’t think this media and Frum-Brooks supposed schism is actually very real, and don’t think social conservatives will have to compromise on this matter very often. But let us embrace the John Stossel’s of the world who share our abhorrence of the far left meddlers that would take away all of our liberty unless we reverse this slouching towards Gomorrah, NOW!

Mike DeVine’s Charlotte Observer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Minority Report columns

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

Originally published @ Examiner.com, where all verification links may be accessed.

Dick Morris echoes Gamecock’s 2006 crowing of the Myth of Moderate Democrats

The man who saved Bill Clinton from the far left of the Democratic Party but who was unable to get him to carpet bomb Osama bin Laden’s lair, wrote this week of the myth of the moderate Democrat. Naturally, this author of the 2006, Drawl and that’s all: The Myth of the Moderate Southern Democrat in D.C., was intrigued by the echo.

Dick Morris wrote mostly of a more specialized version of the rot of the party Andrew Jackson made famous, with his description of the Pelosi cloakroom bargaining for the right of her “blue dawg” subjects to vote against socialized medicine, so long as the bill could be passed to the Senate.

My three year old column was compelled by my experiences of:

• The disconnect between the election years’ rhetoric of MSM and self-described “moderates” like House member John Spratt and Senator Ernest Hollings of my Palmetto State home;
• The voting records of nearly all (the very few exceptions, see Alabama’s Parker Griffith, prove  the rule) Democrats as compared to nearly all Republicans, including their most liberal;
• The Democratic Party’s unpatriotic launch of the “Bush-lied Era” after 911; and
• The musings of the most famous moderate Democrat of the all.

The Picture of Dorian Gray

I do not deny that in many, if not most ways, Bill Clinton’s presidency was a success. I give much credit to Bubba’s Southern-learned pragmatism, but most of the credit must go to the Reagan slayings of inflation and the USSR, as well as his wealth-producing tax and regulation cuts.

This elephant’s ears haven’t forgotten the DNC, supposed moderate, Donkey-in-Chief’s broken middle class tax cut promise; Justices Breyer and Ginsburg; missile technology to China; and the pardoning of FALN terrorists during his last days.

Our Oscar Wilde side is also still repelled by the disconnect between the picture of what WJC did after Newt weilded the Speaker’s gavel, and what he has said walking the earth like a 21st century Dorian Gray, from his:

1. 2003 praise of Iran as the foreign nation’s government most akin to his values;
2. Conversion to the pagan religion of man-made global warming scare merchant-in-chief;
3. Recent admission from the signer of the Defense of Marriage Act under the Gingrich guillotine that he was “always for gay marriage”;
4. The womanizer-in-chief’s recent  public utterance characterizing small-government tea party advocates as gay orgy “tea baggers”; and
5. The public airing of his cynical permanent campaign ideology (shared by President Obama and the late communist Saul Alinsky) admonishing congressional democrats to “pass anything” so they can claim political victory since, after all, they can amend it later.

And that is the best “moderate” the Democrats have?

Yes, it is.

My former party is vile and wrong. It is a vampire that needs a stake driven through its heart in the sunlight. The closest it gets to being killed is usually by the Carter and Obama-like suicides induced by the re-education of mostly non-political independents and duped useful idiot Democrats in the failings of liberal economic and domestic policies as well as the aggression-inviting weakness all Democrats exude to enemies abroad.

I refer to conservatives that vote for Democrats by Lenin’s “useful idiot” term because, given that the left has made Democratic Party its home base for 60+ years, and given their takeover since 1963 (and especially since 2001), any vote for a “D’, empowers the left from the time of their first vote for a Jack Ass speaker to their procedural votes to ram through non-stimuli.

Modern conservatives must disabuse themselves of the notion that there  is not a dimes worth of difference between the parties.

My last calculation found a $1.4 trillion difference between ObamaDems’ first budget and George W. Bush’s worst. It is ObamaDems that want to hike energy taxes on the poor and middle class; usurp your right to choose health insurance; and retreat from defending our Liberty abroad.

The policies of the ObamaDems are extreme by any objective, substantive measure, against nearly any American government from George Washington through George W. Bush.

And if our only hope to keep the City Shining on the Hill are so-called Blue Dawgs, then just go ahead and turn off the lights. I have every confidence that Bayh, Nelsons and Lincolns will let me down again. In fact, the only time I have ever had any expectations met by a Democrat of any kind since 1963 or by a Blue Dog, ever, it has been by this one:

Yet, it is Republicans that always get called “extremists”

Extremists have never held sway in the GOP. Ever. Oh DeVine, you may say, but what about Nixon’s “southern strategy” and those religious right “nuts.”

The Republican Party was born to oppose slavery; was prevented from granting civil rights to Blacks by the Democratic Party for decades after the Civil War; and voted in greater numbers than LBJ’s democrats for the 1964-5 civil and voting rights acts.

Nixon sought votes in the South? Who knew? Yes, former segregationist, mostly southern democrats bolted the Democratic Party in the 60s and 70s, but they never got the first quid pro quo in terms of legislation, judges or policies from the Party of Lincoln.

Most Americans disapprove of abortion as birth control and a majority self-describe as pro-life.

Modern conservatives will only enjoy a governing majority that can turn back ObamaDem socialism by allying themselves with social conservatives. We win with the Reagan-Rush message. We lose with the McCains and Rockefeller country clubbers whose wives and daughters forget to take the pill.

But then, are moderate Republicans of any use?

Yes, but only if they are followers and/or joiners on conservatives’ terms. If moderates lead the GOP, the nation is pulled to the left. The liberals already have a party. Its called the Democratic Party, and as we have seen, it is controlled by the real extremists of any substantial numbers, i.e. leftists.

Moderates, by definition, don’t stand for much of anything, and so are drawn into parochial and institutional concerns, rather than the national interests on substance.

Hence, the supposed “need” to pass something. The use of the anti-conservative mantra that to do “nothing” is unacceptable. The bringing home of the pork. The “need” to reach across the aisle and find a compromise solution. You know, the kind that solve no problem; actually makes the problem worse; but does allow for “maverick” re-election campaigns.

But, given that the northeastern United States continue to enjoy statehood status despite my “reverse-Secession” call for returning them to territorial status and requiring that they pass some Constitution Amendments to rejoin the Union, we must abide the presence of a certain number of moderates after they defeat conservatives in primaries.

We must win a majority in the House and a filibuster-proof super-majority in the Senate if we are to actually reverse the century-long trend to the left that has us slouching towards Gomorrah.

And then there are the “appropriators” that Redstate’s pilgrim describes as under the “moderate” label. I invite that persistent cuss to expound on that sub-category for our enlightenment.

[Portions of this column originally appeared in my debut column with Modern Conservative dot com.]

Mike DeVine’s Charlotte Observer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Minority Report columns

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

[Part one of Mike DeVine's report on Fox Business Channel's, John Stossel's speech last week at Atlanta's Emory University Law School may be reviewed here.]

No more Emmys for you

John Stossel made a name for himself at ABC as the nation’s best consumer affairs reporter. Last Wednesday, before  his “Bashing Business” lecture at Emory Law School’s Tull Auditorium, John Stossel was introduced as a six-time Emmy award winner.

After describing his metamorphosis from big government liberal to free market libertarian, Stossel advised the audience that he won no more Emmys when he started defending private business. He thinks that the fact that market competition actually protects consumers more than government is just too counter-intuitive for too many people in an affluent society that take wealth creation for granted.

DeVine Law agrees, but during a conversation with Atlanta’s guest, we both also agreed that possibly the best hope for a political education in the incompetence of Big Government is taking place as we speak, courtesy of the ObamaDems.

Americans don’t like meddlers

Your humble rooster greeted Stossel as a conservative fan, and even after he described his radical libertarianism (favors abortion on demand; same-sex marriage and drug legalization), we still welcome his philosophy with open arms as his consistency in opposition to government meddling in the affairs of adults, is quite impressive.

No, DeVine Law is still a pro-life defender of marriage who favors a go slow approach on surrendering in the Drug War, and would a oppose such libertarian GOP primary candidates who face strong conservatives that share Stossel’s pure conservative economic views.

But we can’t build a governing majority at the federal level without libertarians, and Stossel is as good an advocate for the free market in economics as one can find. Stossel recently on the Health Care Bill now before Congress:

The 1,990-page bill is breathtaking in its bone-headed audacity. The notion that a small group of politicians can know enough to design something so complex and so personal is astounding. That they were advised by “experts” means nothing since no one is expert enough to do that. There are too many trade-offs faced by unique individuals with infinitely varying needs.

Government cannot do simple things efficiently. The bureaucrats struggle to count votes correctly. They give subsidized loans to “homeowners” who turn out to be 4-year-olds. Yet congressmen want government to manage our medicine and insurance.

Competition is a “discovery procedure,” Nobel-prize-winning economist F. A. Hayek taught. Through the competitive market process, we producers and consumers constantly learn things that force us to adjust our behavior if we are to succeed. Central planners fail for two reasons:

First, knowledge about supply, demand, individual preferences and resource availability is scattered — much of it never articulated — throughout society. It is not concentrated in a database where a group of planners can access it.

Second, this “data” is dynamic: It changes without notice.

No matter how honorable the central planners’ intentions, they will fail because they cannot know the needs and wishes of 300 million different people. And if they somehow did know their needs, they wouldn’t know them tomorrow.

His opposition to “meddlers” reminds of what I consider the sine qua non discourse on same at Hillbilly Politics:

We all know at least one person who meddles in everybody else’s business… and we hate them. There are any number of reasons why we hate them but the most frequent answer to such a question as why is we are adults, not children, and can handle our own lives just fine without interference…

So what does that have to do with politics, you ask?

Simply, if we hate that kind of interference in our daily lives, why did a majority of Americans elect to office a bunch of meddling mothers and mothers-in-law?

* You can’t stimulate the economy by restricting it. If you’re lucky you merely maintain the status quo. If you’re unlucky, as is usually the case, the meddlers make things worse. Propping up failing businesses that didn’t tend to the business of business, aka customer service, only closes the window of opportunity for others to do it better. Entrepreneurship languishes in limbo in this case.

* You can’t replace existing energy with energy that hasn’t been developed yet and you can’t force it by restricting the use of existing energy resources…

You can read all of StephC’s essay here.

After that, check out John Stossel’s 2006 bestseller,  Myths, Lies, and Downright Stupidity: Get Out the Shovel – Why Everything You Know is Wrong (now in paperback).

Liberals prefer to pass new laws when existing laws are more than adequate

One of the most prescient points that Stossel made in Atlanta last week, that was also made by Bob Barr of the AJC, echoes something I discerned about liberals long ago, when in my trial lawyer heyday. Someone would commit a crime or someone would be hurt at work or by a product and the liberal (and, to be fair, not a small number of Republicans in legislatures) knee-jerk response would be to pass a new law to “solve the problem.”

No matter that the “problem” is us. Since Eve bit the apple or, to be more specific, since Cain slew Abel, man has killed, stolen, and been negligent. Moses gave us the Ten Commandments and England gave us the Common Law, and there hasn’t been much improvement on them over the past 3000 years.

But that doesn’t stop leftist Utopians from thinking they can meddle with Titanic deck chairs and make man perfect, and it surely doesn’t stop politicians from the goal of being seen as “doing something” in order to keep the cushy job that requires them to hold their hands out like beggars 24/7 365.

The (Bob) Barr Code:

At a recent Commerce Committee hearing, during which concerns were raised about the constitutionality of such legislation, and about the principle of “federalism,” Rockefeller proudly proclaimed his constitutional disinterest thus — “I don’t really give a hoot about states’ rights or federal rights on this one.  I care about results.”  The “results” include another nail in the coffin of constitutional governance in the United States.

Meddlers will never cease, so neither must we small government conservatives and libertarians. Let us reason together at the federal level and compete over social issues at the state level.

Mike DeVine’s Charlotte Observer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Minority Report columns

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

Originally published @ Examiner.com, where all verification links may be accessed.

DeVine Law thinks it’s about time

Gamecock has long called for Martin Luther King, Jr.-style (with all due respect also to Henry David Thoreau and Mahatma Gandhi) civil disobedience in oil drilling even before ObamaDems took over D.C. with economic policies that prevent We the People from bailing ourselves out of this Great Recession.

Now, religious and social conservatives see a potential Liberty-destroying menace from the American left with respect to many other issues, akin to the losses of free speech rights in Canada and Europe at the hands of ObamaDems’ ideological allies.

The bases for civil disobedience are the threat of the enactment of unjust laws and/or the existence of unjust laws; failure to repeal or prevent the enactment of same via normal political and legal processes; the willingness of movement members to accept the punishment for the breaking of duly and legally enacted laws; and the existence of a political culture that is receptive to moral persuasion.

Ghandi and MLK would have been mowed down by Nazis or Communists in Germany, Cuba or the Soviet Union. Their success was predicated on the fact that the Judeo-Christian values of the British in India and the Americans in America could be shamed into changing their ways. Both did.

Now comes my fellow Southern Baptists, including Dr. Richard Land joining other prominent Christian clergy and others with the Manhattan Declaration (get full text here):

Drafted by Dr. Robert George, Dr. Timothy George and Chuck Colson and signed by more than 125 Orthodox, Catholic and Evangelical Christian leaders, the Manhattan Declaration was made public today following a press conference at the National Press Club in Washington.

Excerpts from the declaration include:

“We are Christians who have joined together across historic lines of ecclesial differences to affirm our right—and, more importantly, to embrace our obligation—to speak and act in defense of these truths. We pledge to each other, and to our fellow believers, that no power on earth, be it cultural or political, will intimidate us into silence or acquiescence.”

“We recognize the duty to comply with laws whether we happen to like them or not, unless the laws are gravely unjust or require those subject to them to do something unjust or otherwise immoral.”

“We will not comply with any edict that purports to compel our institutions to participate in abortions, embryo-destructive research, assisted suicide and euthanasia or any other anti-life act; nor will we bend to any rule purporting to force us to bless immoral sexual partnerships, treat them as marriage or the equivalent or refrain from proclaiming the truth, as we know it, about morality and immorality and marriage and the family.”

One of the great dangers of much of the gay rights activists agenda, especially including hate crimes, civil unions and same-sex marriage laws are that they could invite activist court decisions (if the enacted laws by their express terms don’t impinge rights directly) that could impinge the rights of political religious free speech under the First Amendment with the threat of imprisonment.

Like most conservatives, I oppose hate crimes laws on the merits as they unnecessarily confuse the ordinary general criminal intent or mens re required for deprivations of liberty via due process, with an inquiry into motives and specific intent that are either wholly irrelevant or bet left for consideration in the sentencing phase. Moreover, such laws inevitably devalue the seriousness of harm to and the lives of groups not protected by hate crime laws and threatens the one’s very right to conscious. People do have the right to hate, whether we like it or not, and unless one’s speech reaches the level of “fighting words” or “incitement to imminent violence”, traditionally very strict legal standards, then one should have the right to express such hate. Moreover, from what we have seen in Canada and Europe, the hate crimes laws punish expressions that merely object to certain activities that do not rise to the level of hatred of individuals or groups. Hate the sin and not the sinner comes to mind.

The threat of the above is also present with the enactment of civil union laws that require a determination of one’s sexual “orientation”, as courts may deem such laws as placing the imprimatur of approval on sexual activity outside of traditional marriage and thus threaten the right of parents to have their values inculcated and affirmed, or at least not directly contradicted, by local schools.

These kinds of problems are why the Founders favored maximizing happiness pursuits through the recognition of only individual rights, as opposed to factions or group rights that impinge on the rights of others and for the like-minded to congregate together geographically and exercise power over traditionally local affairs, at the local level and not impose said values on all the people.

DeVine Law will sign the Manhattan Declaration.

Mike DeVine’s Charlotte Observer and Minority Report columns

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

Originally published @ Examiner.com, where all verification links may be accessed.

Actual words of Koran justify murder, the Bible does not

Strict Constructionism is civilization’s friend when applied to the U.S. Constitution and the Bible. Not so when applied to the Koran and other authoritative writings of Islam.

The latter fact is a major factor in the rise of Islamist terror, as the plain and obvious meaning of the actual words of Allah in the Koran lend credibility to those the extremists in the Muslim and Arab worlds and at the same time put peace-loving Muslims on the defensive. It appears that the only thing that reverses their respective roles in their homeland is when a liberty loving Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces of the United States is provoked to defend America, and post-regime change, empowers those that have “re-interpreted” Islam’s admonitions of “jihad”.

It appears that when American power kills enough of those that are actually faithful to the words of the book shared my all Muslims as Holy, the “reformationists” choose soccer and pizza over burka-garbed teen suicide pizza-parlor bombing as sport.

Three Blind Mice and/or See, Hear and Speak no Evil Monkeys?

Since 911 concentrated this Baptist mind, I have long contended that one can’t be a good Muslim and a good American, that is, if the actual words of the Book matter to you. For instance, consider these passages from a column that suggests that those who deny the clear import of the words are “Still Willfully Blind”:

At his blog today, Andrew Bostom, a scholar of jihadism, cites the following passage from “Reliance of the Traveler,” a widely distributed manual of Islamic law produced by al-Azhar University in Egypt, the most authoritative interpreters of theology and sharia jurisprudence in Sunni Islam, the dominant tradition among the world’s Muslims:

Jihad means to war against non-Muslims, and, is etymologically derived from the word, mujahada, signifying warfare to establish the religion [of Islam]…The scriptural basis for jihad is such Koranic verses as “Fighting is prescribed for you” (Koran 2:216); “Slay them wherever you find them” (Koran 4:89); “Fight the idolators utterly” (Koran 9:36); and such hadiths [sayings of the Prophet] as the one related by (Sahih) Bukhari and (Sahih) Muslim that the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) said: “I have been commanded to fight people until they testify that there is no God but Allah and that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, and perform the prayer, and pay zakat. If they say it, they have saved their blood and possessions from me, except for the rights of Islam over them. And the final reckoning is with Allah”; and the hadith by (Sahih) Muslim, “To go forth in the morning or evening to fight in the path of Allah is better than the whole world and everything in it.”

As Dr. Bostom points out, the first hadith referred to in the passage — the one in which Mohammed explains that Allah has commanded the Muslims to fight non-Muslims — was cited by Nidal Hasan in slide 43 of the June 7, 2007 presentation that Jonah discusses in his excellent column today.

How long will the Three Blind Mice of moderate Muslims, the political left (see liberals and Democrats) and our Commander in Chief keep their hands over their eyes and ears and refuse to speak of evil by its name? Must Hyde Park in Chicago of Honolulu be vaporized before the Apologizer-and-Inappropriate-Bower-before-Potentates-and-Emperors-in-Chief gets reality?

It is these same leftist mice and monkeys that spew a political correctness (see cowardly liars) of violent tendency equivalence between the Koran and the Bible; Christianity and Islam; and Osama bin Laden and Timothy McVeigh. The blindness required for such dismissive scoffing would render Stevie Wonder 20/20, as once has to ignore the actual words of the respective holy books; travel back centuries to find Christian church leaders justifying anything approaching justification for murder; ignore the disconnect between what authorities within the respective churches say and don’t say about individuals’ self-justifications for murders vs the position of the respective churches (Christian church leaders and neatly ALL Christians denounce all murder and especially including forced conversion based murder or infidel extermination. Islams leaders are mostly mute); and the exponentially large disparity in the numbers of victims.

In fact, when the left cites those non-Muslim terrorists that they say prove equivalence with Islam, they really help prove my point as the exceptions prove the rule. All they have are the OKC bombing, a few (2-3 incidents since 1973) of abortion clinic bombings and 1-2 murders of abortionists, with victims numbering less than 200. All this despite the fact that a majority of Americans are pro-life. The non-violence of the pro-lifers is self defining.

What of the numbers of victims of Islam, in the name of Islam, with mostly cricket chirps in protests from Mosques? 3000 on 911. Thousands of others since since Sirhan Sirhan gunned down RFK in 1968. Billions spent by the peace-loving to defend against terror. Israel under constant siege and the threat of extermination by Iran’s Mullahs in search of the end of time.

The Books

But DeVine Law, why so much emphasis on the words of the Koran, and how about those village genocides in the Old Testament? After all, look at all those years before the latter half of the 20th century when the Arab and Muslim worlds were mostly benign?

I could mention that America was born partly due to the refusal of Americans to pay tribute to Barbary Pirates (see Islamist terrorists). I could mention that the oil to fuel terror was not discovered in the Muslim world until well into the 20th Century. I could bring up the Cold War between two superpowers that kept the Islamists at bay (but at too high a price given the exponential evils and slaughter of Communism).

I do thank God that most Muslims eschew the real Prophet Muhammad and the actual words of the Koran in favor of a “reformed” Islam that makes kill mean pray and holy war mean strive to do right. Thank God for blind mice, up to a point.

But words matter, both in Holy Books and Constitutions. Men are flawed. Men have, at times twisted the words of the Bible to justify heinous acts. Yes, the numbers of religiously justified heinous acts are dwarfed by the numbers killed by godless Kaiserism, Hitlerism, Fascism, Socialism and Communism, throughout history. But one murder is one too many, no matter the justification, and given the civilization-essentials provided by faith, and especially the Judeo-Christian version, it is quite dangerous for the truth to be transmogrified.

The fact is that the actual words of the Bible, Old and New Testaments, are not only the eternal, spiritual soul-saving truth for believers, they also form the basis for the principles that have made Western Civilization the tolerant and prosperous miracle of history that it is.

No admonitions to murder in the Bible

Nowhere in the Bible will you find admonitions from God or anyone else to prospectively kill. You will find some history of past admonitions at particular times and places in the OT. Moreover, nowhere in the Bible will you find any calls to convert or be killed.

The Koran can make no such claim. For this reason, Islam will always be a danger. Words matter.

So, we conservatives, who properly insist that contracts of all kinds, from home mortgages, up to including Constitutions, be interpreted by the plain meaning and intent of the actual words, must pray that Muslims choose the equivalent of “activist judges” to call black, white for us to have peace.

The better alternative, of course, would be for them to convert to a Book whose strict construction produces peace. Let us pray. But in the meantime, I would be willing that some of our liberal friends that have re-written the US Constitution to justify abortion and the Bible to justify Government loving my neighbor with my money, apply the same logic to the Koran and make jihad mean scoring Goal in the World Cup.

God bless.

Mike DeVine’s Charlotte Observer and Minority Report columns

“One man with courage makes a majority.” – Andrew Jackson

Originally published @ Examiner.com, where all verification links may be accessed.