Once upon a time there was an enchanted place called Imagination Land, where everything was just as wonderful as you could make believe it was.

Say yes to conservative Obama job-creation proposals, one issue/bill at a time while singing Tom Petty’s The Waiting

The state of our union circa 2011 need not be so dire.

Was it going to take years to climb out of the wealth-destruction hole wrought by the bursting of the housing bubble coupled with decades of accumulating national and personal debt? Yes, but after President Barack Obama’s first State of the Union address soon after his Inauguration and proposed Stimulus Bill why he had proposed so little job-creating public works/infrastructure spending and that what little was proposed was back-loaded to only kick in 18 months later when unemployment was near double digits and rising.

The excuse seems to be that Lawyer Obama never organized communities to build anything and so he was naive about shovel-readiness, but since the lack of readiness is caused by oppressive environmental regulations and trial lawyers and since Obama has shown that he will waive regulations at will to prevent foreigners from helping with oil spills and will ignore congressional action and court orders to wage EPA war against Texas on land and oil drilling at sea, we aren’t accepting the excuse.

Ground was ready to be shoveled in 2009, hence we have had to conclude that he and the Democrats don’t care about the poor, unemployed and underemployed, or at least that they care more about the transformation of American society into a post-Rule of Law political/corporate crony economy and socialist, cradle-grave European-like society dependent on ObamaCare for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Michelle says hold the fried chicken. She knows best?

So, more hearts have broken, because much like Petty’s Heartbreakers:

The waiting (in poverty) is the hardest part.

We were also told that Obama was a centrist in 2008, and that the appointments of Clintonistas named Rahm Emanuel, Larry Summers and Christina Roemer were the proof. Yet, instead of the triangulating presider over balanced budgets and the end of big government, we got a gargantuan government and prosperity stealing deficits and debt. So, why should we believe that the replacement of three former Clintonistas with a different set augers change?

Well, I do think that Obama has shown some change in strategy based on the shellacking in the Lame Duck and do believe that he will propose some things conservatives favor as real supply-side and other types of real stimuli. Of course, he can be expected to try and use the issues for 2012 purposes of keeping wool pulled over eyes through tried and true devices of compromise that would induce Republicans to water down the policies that work in exchange for conceding for Liberty and power to Obama and the government generally.

The GOP must resist compromise. Tea partiers were sent to Capitol Hill in revulsion to big government failed liberal economic policies. They were not sent up there to get along with liberals. The GOP must not give the Dems an excuse by introducing multi-issue bills designed to gain more votes. rather, they should take each and every issue proposed in the SOTU speech and propose them in single issue bills. As I recall, one of the matters emphasized tea partiers was also the demand that bills be short enough to read.

The message that needs to be sent to Obama by the GOP is that we will say yes to correct policy, no to bad policy and will share credit for the recovery.

Is there a danger that a growing economy might re-elect a still radical leftist and prevent the repeal of laws out in place over the last two years while also keeping in office  a weak on defense appeaser of Iran that would be given more opportunities to weaken America at home and abroad? Yes, but we have to take that chance due to the level of suffering in this recession.

Jobs and the Post-State-of-the-Union GOP House Strategy

We can still defeat Obama in 2012 if we will take the gloves off on the moral reality that while Republicans favor job-creation policies every day of every year, ObamaDems only favor them when the public gets re-educated in how their liberal dependency policies don’t work and have to do things like triangulate closer to elections.

Most elected Democrats in D.C., especially including Obama, don’t care about the quality of life of We the People in any absolute way. They care about gaining more and more power over us, as is clear from the “reform” policies of the last two years when the only jobs they sought to save were state and local public sector union cronies or the private sector equivalent at GM and the only jobs they created were tens of thousands of federal government regulators.

The GOP will have to be about the business of fixing the economy and the budget; FIRING those hired by Obama; and getting Obama and Harry Reid fired in 2012, but only in that order.

Single issue bills are the ticket.

Mike DeVine

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

Charlotte Observer, The Minority Report and Examiner.com archives

www.devinelawvista.com

Kingdom of Heaven

Docs 4 Patient Care is a group of doctors who are fighting fiercely to repeal Obamacare, or the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA). For months now, they have been quietly waging war against socialized medicine without much help or recognition. However, on July 27th, Dr. Mark Neerhof (a member of Doctors 4 Patient Care) sparred with Dr. Arnold Widen (a doctor in favor of Obamacare) in a no holds barred debate on a Chicago radio station that was moderated by Milton Rosenberg.

Dr. Neerhof comes out swinging in the beginning of the debate by pounding the other side with a plethora of facts. Specifically, Dr. Neerhof uses Massachusetts as a template for the perils of socialized medicine, since government run health care in MA is now proving to be a disastrous idea.

Neerhof begins by pointing out the following facts– Read the rest of this entry »

Two years ago, poultry’s greatest oracle saw 2008′s Summer of $4.00 /gallon gasoline as the beginning of the end of this affluent society’s fetish with faux man-made global warming-moral preening. Getting to work and buying food trumped feel-good, paganistic gaia worship.

Now, twenty years after a generation was indoctrinated by Al Gore and two years into the Great Recession, comes this:

By a 55% to 32% margin, most voters continue to believe finding new sources of energy is more important than reducing the amount of energy Americans now consume. Support for finding new sources of energy has been this high or higher for months.

Complete Cockstradamus-confirming Rassmussen poll results here and previous energy and environmental prognostications here.

Too bad we have a representation without consideration regime instead of a government that reflects the wishes of We the People. I think the disconnect portends a future affirmation of a long-running Cockstradamus forecast of civil disobedience before any GOP super-majorities could reverse the ObamaDem socialism and now Mark Levin agrees.

Braves-Gamecock

Early last Spring when future Braves Hall-of-Famers, John Smoltz and Tom Glavine were struggling with facing up to the end of their careers, Cockstradamus predicted that both would either be Braves broadcasters or employed as coaches or in the front office by the Atlanta Braves.

Both are in the broadcast booth this year and Smoltz is arguably the most entertaining color commentator ever.

The year of the Chicken is coming

When will civil disobdience start? 2011? Not sure, but I am confident that next year will see a significant increase in the number of households that keep and raise chickens for food, thanks to the refusal of ObamaDems to allow us to bail ourselves out of this deep recession in which the under-employment rate rivals that of the bulk of the years of the Great Depression at upwards of 18% and higher.

The chicken is a very efficient recession-blunter what with the eggs, breasts, thighs, wings, alarm clock and strong male role model.

Cock-a-doodle-do, and yes, the only debate left about Tiger Woods is by how many strokes will he win this weekend’s Masters.

Cockstradamus says by 2 strokes over Lee Westwood.

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.

Since the first unveiling of the various interations of Democratic Party-sponsored health care reform last summer, the American people have sent unequivocal, vocal and electoral messages of their disgust and opposition to the socialist America tipping point that was the passage of the ObamaCare legislation last month.

The 21st Century tea partiers inspired to dump over-water mortgages into Lake Michigan as Obama rescued delinquent mortgagors, switched gears to protest a loss of Liberty to pursue health happiness much larger than even the liberties restricted by King George’s, that were so intolerable to the Founders and the original tea partiers in Boston Harbor in the 18th Century.

Town Hall meetings held by Democratic Party Representatives on recess after their first votes for socialized medicine before the 2009 vernal equinox loudly rang the bell of Liberty in opposition to massive Medicare cuts bearing no relation any reform, but rather more resembling a robbery.

Then, every time the politically aroused were given a chance to register their disgust with ObamaDems in special elections, they booted the jack asses out in Virginia, New Jersey, and, most poignantly in the late Ted Kennedy’s Massachusetts, where it appeared the election of Scott Brown had stopped socialised medicine in in its tracks.

Then came polls showing that the Democrats were already labeled as far left socialists in the voters minds due to their prior votes, and that they would suffer massive losses in 2010′s mid-term election no matter if they passed ObamaCare or not, especially given the deep recession that has sealed their fate in any event.

So, they defied representative democracy and imposed the personal Marxist dreams of ObamaDems on America by making the private insurance industry a public utility on the way to utter destruction; discouraging even more doctors from staying in practice, not to mention discouraging gifted students from becoming doctors in the first place; massively raising taxes on businesses small and large; saddling the states with massive unfunded Medicaid and Medicare mandates; and required, beginning in four years, that all subjects of the King by his insurance policy from his local agents, e.g. Blue Cross Blue Shield, et al…).

Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi told us prior to the vote on the $2Trillion+ bill that Americans would realize how much they like the legislation, after it passes and everyone had a chance to read it!

The reading has continued, and next week, we will see the state of reading comprehension in a portion of the Sunshine State. Hopefully, the sun that didn’t shine on Pelosi’s bill before it passed will enlighten former voters Bob Wexler, far leftie Democrat (but I repeat myself, since ALL 60 Democrat senators voted for ObamaCare, and all but 34 of the 200+ Dem Representatives voted for same, but none of whom also voted against ObamaDems’ stimulus that wasn’t and currency-destroying budgets).

That’s right, the first special election after the passage of health care reform is in a previously-proven far left Democratic Party house district, much like the Ted Kennedy seat in the senate was the last vote before its passage.

So, tea partiers, irate seniors on Medicare, newly-enlightened Democrats and reliable Republicans, Do Not Be Discouraged! Get out and vote for Republican Edward Lynch to represent Florida House District 19 in Washington so that the building of the roster to repeal the blood-sucking, Dem-o-bat ObamaCare can begin!

P.S. Inspired by The Minority Report’s Pilgrim at Redstate.

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.

March began with white coated doctors at the White House, unable to reconcile the lies of a rabid socialized-medicine hound, committing malpractice by failing to first do no harm by clothing the big-eared, self-described mutt in a strait jacket.

We hope Sandra Bullock Blind Sides Oscar’s dogs tonight, but Braves-Gamecock hopes the madness continues with his undergraduate alma mater’s Terriers making the Big dance for the first time:

Since moving to Division I in 1995, the Wofford men’s basketball team has never made the NCAA tournament.

But this might be the year.

“I would streak back to Radford if that were to happen,” said Wofford coach Mike Young, a Radford High School graduate.

Young, 47, has steered Wofford (21-8, 13-3 Southern Conference) to its first 20-win season at the Division I level.

“There’s a lot of things to enjoy with a Heineken in hand this spring, but still a lot to accomplish,” said Young, an Emory & Henry graduate.

The winner of Thursday’s game between Wofford and visiting College of Charleston (19-9, 13-3) will clinch the SoCon regular-season title — and an automatic bid to the NIT, should that team not win the automatic NCAA bid that goes to the SoCon tournament champ. Wofford has never been to the NIT, either.

Wofford, a Spartanburg, S.C., school with just 1,439 students, has won eight straight since losing to Bobby Cremins’ College of Charleston squad 70-68 last month.

Wofford’s first win over our law school alma mater’s Gamecocks since 1939 earlier this year defined the regular season.

Last year’s leading Southern Conference  March Madness star now an NBA sensation

I thought Davidson’s Stephen Curry might have been too small to make in the land of giants. Happily, I was wrong…

Burning question for April: Will Cockstradamus be right about Tiger at the Masters and baseball happening every Spring. I think so.

We can see the State Capitol from atop the rock MLK memorialized, but what we can’t see and wish we could, are:

Bleeding heart liberal public college professors willing to bleed their fat wallets to ensure that more low income students won’t face tuition hikes due to the Peach State’s massive budget shortfall;

Ethics legislation passed into law that protects us from rotten peaches, despite the lack of recent headlines about lobbyist-legislator incest.; and

Rep. Stephanie Stuckey Benfield’s (D-85) criminal records expengement bill passed into law.

Camel-not’s King doesn’t know Jack

(H/T to Rush Limbaugh’s parody with Bill Clinton as Merlin the Magician suggesting that King Obama and his square pegs’ poor fit at JFK’s Round Table.)

Jack Kennedy wouldn’t have prosecuted Justice Department lawyers and the CIA interrogators they advised for swabbing the nose of 911′s architect; Navy Seals that rubbed the tummy of terrorist muderers; nor read  the BVD-bomber Miranda rights while dismissing charges against ACORN pimps and New Black Panther voter intimidation thugs.

Evan Bayh wouldn’t have felt the need to give up a safe senate seat due to disgust with a JFK-led Democratic Party. One only wishes Bayh had the courage to have waved bye-bye to the blood-sucking vampie of a Dem-o-Bat party rather than bemoaning a supposed “broken” Washington just as We the People were exerting our will to fix D.C.

This all reminds this rooster of H. L. Menchen’s description of the World’s Oldest political party as jackels worshipping jack asses.

Finally, with more hat tips to Rush and Mark Steyn: Want to see a non-strait-jacketed ObamaCare future? See Greece:

While Barack Obama was making his latest pitch for a brand new, even more unsustainable entitlement at the health care “summit,” thousands of Greeks took to the streets to riot. An enterprising cable network might have shown the two scenes on a continuous split-screen – because they’re part of the same story. It’s just that Greece is a little further along in the plot: They’re at the point where the canoe is about to plunge over the falls. America is further upstream and can still pull for shore, but has decided, instead, that what it needs to do is catch up with the Greek canoe. Chapter One (the introduction of unsustainable entitlements) leads eventually to Chapter 20 (total societal collapse): The Greeks are at Chapter 17 or 18.

What’s happening in the developed world today isn’t so very hard to understand: The 20th century Bismarckian welfare state has run out of people to stick it to. In America, the feckless insatiable boobs in Washington, Sacramento, Albany and elsewhere are screwing over our kids and grandkids. In Europe, they’ve reached the next stage in social democratic evolution: There are no kids or grandkids to screw over. The United States has a fertility rate of around 2.1 – or just over two kids per couple. Greece has a fertility rate of about 1.3: 10 grandparents have six kids have four grandkids – i.e., the family tree is upside down. Demographers call 1.3 “lowest-low” fertility – the point from which no society has ever recovered. And, compared with Spain and Italy, Greece has the least-worst fertility rate in Mediterranean Europe.

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.

Martin Luther King showed us the way to defeat defiant Democrats

In the aftermath of the Scott Browning-out of the Ted Kennedy legacy in Massachusetts, we suspect further ObamaDem health care overreach and defiance of We the People that can only be turned back by Martin Luther King Jr.-style non-violent civil disobedience en mass.

[Mike DeVine Law Gamecock returns from his longest absence during our three years as Law & Politics columnist for Examiner.com. During our absence, necessitated by our orientation in our new position with an Atlanta area law firm, we missed writing our Ninth annual column for Martin Luther King Day as Haiti was destroyed, but return in time to comment contemporaneously on the Biggest Reality Mugging in recent history in the Bay State.]

As we witness President Barack Obama’s exercise of American exceptionalism in Haiti, that he spent his first year in office denying or denouncing as having been “imposed by a world order”, we celebrate another manifestation of it in the Commonwealth of Massachsetts’ rejection of ObamaCare.

The only issues remaining concerning the threat to American Liberty from the separate ObamaCare bills that passed the House and Senate late last year is whether Democrats accept the message or continue to defy the wishes of the citizens they serve.

Drawl and that’s all: The Myth of the Moderate Democrat

Last year we received conclusive proof of the decades-old myth of the moderate Democrat when the votes of all 60 were needed to ram thru 2000 lumps of coal-like pages on Christmas Eve. So I had to agree with an astute conservative Republican political observer and  lawyer in Gwinnett County who suspects that the Jack Asses will more resemble their mule cousins when it comes to stubbornness in altering behavior after sharp slaps on the head.

While we hear many elected Democratic Party voices suggesting that ObamaCare is dead, we are reminded of all the moderate braying of Democrat drawls since the 1960s that never translated into votes that defied their supposed more liberal bosses. We suspect that Speaker Pelosi will threaten enough so-called pro-life House Democrats with their own political abortions to get a majority to pass the more pro-abortion Senate bill on the way to a Rose garden signing ceremony.

Obama v McCain

During many pre-2008-election intra-party debates inspired by our uninspiring McCain side of the GOP ticket, I argued that the only way it would be better for the conservative movement and, most importantly, America itself, for Obama to win, would be if we could prevent the passage of permanent entitlements that would never be repealed.

I was always sure that the life under super-majority ObamaDem rule,  would result in Americans’ re-education in the proven-failed liberal policies abroad and at home that we experienced in the late 70s. The 2009 results in Virginia and New Jersey and writ large in the just completed Plymouth Rock drop onto Harry Reid’s head, vindicate that Cockstradamus vision as well as the Rush Limbaugh Ronaldus Magnus maxim regarding the marketability of unabashed, unapologetic conservatism regardless of region, especially when the environment is saturated with disgust for leftist overreach.

But if the ObamaDems go on and defy We the People and impose the transformation of the health care industry as public utility on America, then it will not have been worth the lesson given the history of other such huge entitlement codifications and the fecklessness of the Grand Old Party when it holds the reins of power.

We suspect that the only way the ObamaCare socialist tipping point can be turned back is by following the example of the great man whose birth we celebrated last week.

MLK vs Democrats

When a young Montgomery, Alabama pastor from Atlanta directed bus boycotts, letters from jails and marches over bridges and on Washington, D.C., he was at all times seeking to repeal unjust laws passed by defiant Democrats. He had many more allies in that struggle in the GOP of his father, Martin Luther King, Sr. and Abraham “The Great Emancipator” Lincoln, which party was created to end slavery.

King, unlike the present occupant of the White House, believed deeply in American exceptionalism, despite existing segregation laws. He knew that most all Americans were infused with the same Judeo-Christian values he preached and that they could be appealed to within our system.

King’s dream that one day little black boys would hold hands with little white boys while hearing freedom ring from the Stone Mountain of Georgia came true. Our exceptionalism was proven long before the First Lady first discovered some of it in votes for her husband in 2007.

We could soon face a dire circumstance of a Liberty defying law directed at our very lives in the end of the protection of the unalienable right to pursue happiness via health care. We cannot claim taxation without representation as could King and those at the first Boston Tea Party.  But that does not diminish the fact of the denial of liberty just as great.

Some astute political observers fear that there could be riots in the streets should the Democrats ram the ObamaCare bill into law in this environment. Violence must be opposed, but we should not settle merely for the prospects of future election results to pave the way for repeal.

Non-violent civil disobedience is the way

I have long advocated non-violent civil disobedience with respect to oil drilling given the 32-year moratorium on expanded drilling imposed by the Democrats. Then came the ban on Edison’s bulb. I also support the recently announced Manhattan Declaration to defy unconstitutional laws, court rulings and regulations that infringe upon speech and religious freedoms.

A massive defiance of a Health Care Bill signed by President Obama may well be the only way to ensure repeal and the restoration of the Liberty that our forefathers, including MLK, fought and died for.

America should be proud of the aid we are sending to Haiti, and especially some of the well-to-do orthopedic surgeons donating their valuable time to make sure those with simple broken bones in Port-au-Prince don’t get added to the earthquake death toll.

But doctors alone can’t repair an America broken by Big Goverment. A defiant Congress can only be tamed by a defiant people.

Economics 101

Many liberals simply don’t understand what creates the wealth that makes it possible for us to help the Haiti’s of the world. They take it for granted that the wealth created due to the economic liberty and private property rights the founders devised, will remain no matter what burdens they put on doctors or investors.

The health care bill would be the final blow to an economy already stifled by Fannie Mae-like intrusions into the market.

The moral heart of capitalism and conservative epiphanies

Lastly, let me address the false allegation of some on the left, that it would be “heartless” not to pass one of the two bills on the table or a compromise thereof, as I heard yesterday in person.

Americans have never been “heartless”, and the existing state of health care is nothing if not a huge heart with the requirement that no one be turned away from emergency rooms receiving federal aid.

The Republican Party has held all the power in D.C. several times since FDR and never have they sought to end nor substantially reduce the Reagan endorsed “safety net for the truly needy” in Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid or food stamps.

Once can argue that a heart-filled person should seek some repeals, but by the Democrats’ own standards, the GOP passes “heart” muster.

Doing “nothing”, then, would not be heartless, nor does a failure to pass ObamaCare prevent doing something in the future that improves the status quo.

I switched parties in large part due to my heart for people, especially the poor, and the results of the policies of Democrats vs the policies of the GOP, clearly vindicate my elephantine memory of a heartless Democratic Party when it came to victim-defendants trapped in welfare or millions suffering under the Soviet Union.

I heart We the People, hence, I am a Republican.

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.

Give us time to read ObamaCare bill and advise our Congressional employees and we won’t need to see Obama-promised debate on C-Span.

In 1993-4 I defended Hillary’s behind closed doors meetings to draft President Bill Clinton’s health care bill and also defended Vice President Dick Cheney’s similar meetings in 2001 with regard to energy policy.

Why? Because the best and most honest advice is often given only when one is free to speak without immediate ridicule, and, most importantly, everything Congress does has to be written down and voted on.

HillaryCare was never brought after its details were made public. Democrats filibustered Bush Administration-proposed expanded oil drilling. We also recall the loud public advice given to Bush-McCain’s illegal alien amnesty bill.

But under Obama-Reid-Pelosi filibuster-proof super-majority rule, final 2000-page amendments to bills are rushed to the floor for votes within 24 hours or less, and so the public is denied the opportunity to supervise our elected employees.

Desperate for a vehicle to stop the deaf-to-the-will-of-We-the-People ObamaDems’ insistence on a bribe-produced bill to socialize American medicine, conservatives and independents have seized upon then candidate Obama’s eight or more promises to take over the private company C-Span and force them to televise health care negotiations.

Obama also promised not to sign bills before they had first been posted on the Internet for at least 72 hours. That promise was broken with the first bill signed by the president, i.e. the non-stimulus government growthulus bill and every bill since.

Obama lies. You can tell when he is lying when you see the TelePrompter speaking.

There is nothing wrong with confidential negotiations per se. In fact, they are necessary for Presidents to receive frank and honest advice and for legislators to fashion compromises.

But when you have a deceitful Democratic Party and Messiah for a president, all of whom deem the constitution and voters to be a nuisance, then you can’t trust them to give you time to read bills that will radically change your pursuits of happiness.

How is that Hope and Change working for you Obama voters 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.

This is truly unbelievable – President Obama said today: “But as I’ve said, in the long run, we can’t continue to spend as if deficits don’t have consequences; as if waste doesn’t matter; as if the hard-earned tax dollars of the American people can be treated like Monopoly money.”

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Transcript here:

When my administration walked through the door, the country faced a growing economic downturn as well as a deepening fiscal hole. Washington had passed massive tax cuts for the wealthy (producers) and an expensive new entitlement program without paying for any of it. Health care costs continued to rise, year after year. And little effort was made to cut wasteful spending. As a result, over the previous eight years, the national debt doubled — doubled. In January, the deficit stood at $1.3 trillion. And we had to make the difficult decision to add to the deficit in the short term to prevent the potential collapse of our economy.

But as I’ve said, in the long run, we can’t continue to spend as if deficits don’t have consequences; as if waste doesn’t matter; as if the hard-earned tax dollars of the American people can be treated like Monopoly money. That’s what we’ve seen time and time again. Washington has been more concerned about the next election than the next generation. It’s put off hard choices in spending bill after spending bill, budget after bloated budget.

H/T to Gateway Pundit